


Just drink this and we can do whatever you want

by Juh_Nunes



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bars and Pubs, Consent, Consent Issues, F/M, Getting Together, HP: EWE, Leaky Cauldron, Love Potion/Spell, Lust Potion/Spell, M/M, Magical Theory, Post-War, Potions, Potions Theory, Pre-Slash, Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, Wizarding Traditions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-03-15 21:25:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13621968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Juh_Nunes/pseuds/Juh_Nunes
Summary: Harry was tired of people trying to dose him with love potions, so he decided to create a charm to counter it. Now he only needs to test it, unfortunately (or not) it doesn’t work as he was expecting.





	Just drink this and we can do whatever you want

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to GreiceMK for being so patient with me, for listening to me all the times I got insecure over the plot, or the sub-plot, or the relationships, and for helping me think all the times I got stuck! Thank you so much to my wonderful beta TdCat for understanding what I wanted to say and making sure other people would be able to understand, too. And for erasing all the wrong commas, Merlin only knows how many commas you erased! And to the amazing mods that answered all my questions quickly and patiently, you deserve all the credits for this amazing fest!  
> *The names of the potions used in this fic were taken from the movies, and are considered by me one of the only good things the movies did.

Harry’s life had changed a lot in the years that passed since the end of the war. He was an Auror now, and Ron was his partner. He lived on his own in a Muggle flat close to the Ministry. He and Ginny had decided that they didn’t really work well together, they were better as friends. And he found out that he wasn’t only interested in women when it came to dating.

What hadn’t changed was his fame and how people reacted to him. Harry wasn’t mobbed anymore, thank Merlin for that, but people still followed his every move with interest and there were always new articles about his life in the _Prophet_. That wasn’t really the bad part though: Harry didn’t like it, but he could deal with nosy reporters and people gaping at him just fine. The bad part was the harassment.

At first it didn’t bother him too much. He was an Auror after all, he could deal with some overly excited witches, even with ones who sent his Auror dropbox some rather explicit pictures, no big deal.

Things got annoying when people started to ask him on dates and flirt with him whenever he went out, but as long as they didn’t do anything while he was in his Auror uniform, he was okay with it.

Things only got unbearable when people started trying to slip him love potions. More than once Hermione and Ron had to physically contain him after one of those attempts. Luckily, Ron had got into the habit of carrying the basic love potions antidote from Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes wherever they went.

“I know how you feel, mate,” Ron had said, after the first time it happened, remembering their sixth year.

But since his new found bisexuality appeared on the papers, things got even worse. Harry couldn’t take his eyes away from his pint in the pub even for a second, and once he got into a bathroom only to be greeted by a wizard with his wand pointed at him. Before his assailant had the opportunity to do anything, though, Harry’s Auror training kicked in and he disarmed and immobilized the wizard in one swift move.

The bloke had said he only wanted to make Harry like him, and that he was only going to hit Harry with a mild infatuation charm. And how disturbing was it that his reasoning was actually considered normal? The bloke was let go with only a warning not to do it again. And that disturbed Harry more than anything else that had happened until that point.

Harry was already quite sick of it all, when an idea popped into his mind, and like good ideas tend to do, this one refused to leave him alone for weeks, until he decided he had to do something about it. The thing was, he had no idea how.

Hermione would probably know exactly what to do. And she would also get totally obsessed over yet another project. She was already dealing with so much, though. Her project to improve house-elves’ work conditions was a little stuck, as there was too much opposition from the house-elves’ owners, and considering they were the richest and most influential part of society, Hermione was having a lot of trouble getting the new guidelines approved.

She was also in a campaign to improve werewolves’ lives, and that one was doing a little better. Harry was helping her with the public side of it and had already given multiple interviews talking about how a well-adjusted werewolf taking the Wolfsbane potion brings no harm to society.

And Harry wasn’t even considering Hermione’s actual job at the Department for Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, or her impending wedding. He couldn’t possible burden her with one more thing to do.

Ron was also busy with the wedding plans, even more so than Hermione, since he was pretty much making all the decisions on his own with only Mrs Weasley’s and Mrs Granger’s help. Also, Harry was pretty sure Ron would have exactly the same charm work skills as his own, so it wouldn’t really help him work through the puzzle.

He could ask for Ginny and Luna’s help. Luna was extremely intelligent, and Ginny was the only one able to keep her grounded. But Luna also had a lot of side projects, even more than Hermione, and Ginny was too busy training with the Harpies to help Harry keep Luna focused.

Neville wouldn’t be interested unless Harry found a way to get some plants involved. Seamus would manage to set everything on fire even before they started working on it. And Dean was too busy with his tattoo shop in Diagon Alley.

Then the obvious answer came to his mind. He knew someone who had been experimenting with spell work and inventing things for years. And Harry could kick himself for not thinking of him sooner. George would be the perfect person to help him.

Harry went straight to Wheezes after his shift at the Ministry. George was not too busy; with most of his clients at Hogwarts, he had more owl post orders than customers in the shop. He left his assistant tending the cash register and guided Harry to his storage room, where they would be able to talk in private.

The walls of the storage room were covered with tall shelves filled with product stock, but in the center George had left a bit of space for a working area. There were two tables crowded with experiments, and two cauldrons, with colourful potions boiling, dangerously close to each other.

Harry sat with George on the chairs in the corner and explained his idea the best way he could. He didn’t know much about crafting spells, so he only had a general idea of what he wanted.

“So, you want my help to create a spell that nullifies the effects of love and lust potions?” George asked him, with a raised eyebrow. “You do realise it might take months, or even years, right?”

“I know,” Harry said, taking a deep breath, “but I can’t take it anymore, George. I can’t go to the pub without someone trying to put something in my drink—”

“Yeah,” George grimaced, “Ron told us about the time someone slipped a love potion into your coffee inside the Ministry… No one caught who did it, right?”

That was actually one of the main reasons Harry was doing this. Most of the time, there was no way of knowing who dosed him without drinking the potion, and of course he couldn’t drink the potions, since there was no way of knowing if it was only a love potion, or something else mixed with it using the love potions as a disguise.

“No idea who did it,” Harry shrugged. “But Robards is convinced it was an outside job. Probably someone from another department.”

“It is still worrisome,” George said, nodding, “I can see why you would want an extra layer of protection.”

“So, are you helping me?”

“Okay,” George said, placing a hand under his chin, in a thinking position. “I still don’t see how I can make it profitable…” he stood up and started pacing the little space left in the storage room. “But I didn’t forget that you were our first investor, and the first person to take this business seriously, and not think of it as a hobby… Yeah, I can do it.”

“How are we going to do it?” Harry asked, feeling excited.

“First we’ll have to analyze the ingredients of all the love potions and isolate the ones that have the effect of loosening the subject’s cognitive thinking,” George said, still pacing the room. “You know I’m not a Potions Master, and I only know enough about _Amortentia_ and the _Wonder Witch Love Potions_ we sell here, but they have the same key ingredients, and I would bet all of the others also have the same ingredients in varying amounts and preparations.”

“I can’t believe you still sell those things, by the way,” Harry said, shaking his head. “I was dosed with your _Kissing Concoction_ once, and it’s not a joke.”

“Well, Harry, they are really profitable,” George shrugged. “I make  hundreds of galleons on love potions every year. And you know they are all pretty mild, and easy to resist.”

“That’s not true. If you don’t know the potion is coming you can’t resist it at all, really. I didn’t have any fun trying to kiss the idiot that put it in my pint. I wouldn’t ever do it consciously,” Harry said, crossing his arms over his chest, and feeling annoyed. “You really shouldn’t sell those things.”

“I will think about it,” George said with a dismissive hand wave, and Harry knew he wouldn’t. “Anyway, after we isolate the key ingredients, we have to create a spell that counters their effect. There is a whole discussion about how potions counteract each other, but there are effective ways to do it with spells. We’ll have to figure out the exact elements we need to counter before crafting the spell, and we should probably calculate it based on the strongest potion… But first things first, we’ll need to do the research,” he added with a grimace.

“That’s the moment I regret not asking for Hermione’s help,” Harry laughed, and followed George to his flat above the shop, where he kept his books and notes.

Harry had been doing research with George for a few hours when he realised he was late for pub night and left Wheezes in a hurry.

Pub night had started the year after the war ended. Ron and Harry were starting their second year of Auror training, and Hermione had got an internship at the DRCMC. They almost didn’t have time to spend together, so they established that every Friday night, no matter what, they would get together at the Leaky.

Of course the _no matter what_ part was not very practical. Harry and Ron got stuck in training more often than not, so they changed it to _unless there are extenuating circumstances_ , which was much more realistic.

Since then a lot of people had  joined their little tradition. Ginny was the first, back when she and Harry were still trying to make their relationship work and failing miserably. Luna joined in after Harry and Ginny broke up and Ginny found out things worked way better with Luna. Harry couldn’t be happier for them. Neville came with Luna once and had not stopped coming since. Dean and Seamus ended up there coincidentally one night and also became regulars.

But the really unforeseeable companions to their pub night had come about two years after they started the tradition.

When Draco started working at the DRCMC with Hermione and took an interest in her side projects, Harry and Ron had been wary — they thought he was probably only showing interest to improve his family’s reputation. Narcissa had been donating money to all the right causes and making appearances in all the right galas. Back then Harry thought Draco was probably just following his mother’s footsteps. But three years had passed, and Draco had never asked anything from them. Now Hermione actually considered him a friend, and he had been present at pub night for almost a year.

As expected, other Slytherins came with him. Surprisingly enough, Harry and his friends ended up liking their company. Though at first things were a little awkward, they quickly started focusing on commonalities and left the war behind.

Pansy was funny in a whole clueless way. Greg was actually really kind, unless Draco provoked him. Blaise acted nonchalant but was always paying attention to everything around him. Theo was smart and so similar to Hermione that it scared Ron sometimes. But what had really surprised Harry, was Draco.

Draco was not at all the same as Harry remembered from school. Their last interaction before Draco started coming to pub night had been at the Malfoys’ trials, when Draco thanked Harry in a very subdued manner, and Harry gave Draco back his wand. Back then Draco seemed to be broken by the war, just like Harry. But the war had ended a long time ago, and all of them had changed a lot since school.

Now that Harry was getting to know Draco, he thought Draco was fascinating. He was still opinionated and sarcastic, but he was also dedicated to Hermione’s causes — apparently when he was a kid, he used to talk to the Manor’s house-elves all the time and didn’t really agree with the way his father treated them. Draco was stubborn and refused to take no for an answer. He was kind to Greg, in a way Harry never saw with anyone else around them. And he had beautiful eyes...

Ron was sure Harry was obsessed with Draco all over again, and Hermione was always giving Harry knowing looks whenever she caught him staring at Draco too much. He had to admit, sometimes he asked her about Draco more than could be considered normal, and she never failed to point that out. But Harry ignored both of them, and kept observing Draco as if it were nothing out of the ordinary. Privately, he also had to admit he had been doing it a little too much, though.

But he couldn’t help it. Draco was not only fascinating, he was also intriguing. He called everybody at pub night by their first names except Harry, whom he still insistently called _Potter_. He laughed whenever someone said something funny, but when Harry did it, he only looked at Harry attentively while everybody else laughed. It was like Draco was friends with everybody there except Harry, and that drove Harry crazy.

When Harry arrived at the pub, the Leaky was full, as was usual for a Friday night, but Harry found his group easily. They had been using the same private booth for the past five years, after all. Everybody was already there, and Harry knew what that meant.

“You are late!” Ginny shouted at him the moment he entered the booth, and started to shake her pint glass in his direction.

He made a mental list of everybody’s drinks and left the booth. Whoever arrived last had to pay for the next round, a tradition since Ginny and Luna started to come. Harry didn’t really mind, but Ron made sure to always be the first one to arrive at the pub.

Hannah saw him approach before he could reach the counter and started to fill the glasses with his friends’ prefered beverages. She was used to it, since she had been working at the Leaky for the past three years, and by now, she knew exactly what Harry’s group drank.

“Late?” Hannah asked with a smile when Harry approached.

“Got distracted,” Harry shrugged, levitating the tray.

Harry always had to be careful with his drinks as he made his way from the counter to their booth. One time he got distracted and someone dosed Luna’s drink with _Flirting Fancies_ from Wheezes’ _Wonder Witch Line_. Luna started to shamelessly flirt with everybody in their booth. They were pretty sure Harry was the intended target, but there was no way of proving it. They had no idea who had done it, since the potion made the person flirt with everyone they could see, and George had no registry of whom bought the potion... He really should stop selling them.

“But you won’t believe what she said after that!” Hermione was saying when Harry got back to the booth and started to hand out the drinks. He sat in the only empty chair, close to Ron, and did a quick revealing charm over his pint before starting to drink.

“That old hag?” Draco snorted. “I can believe whatever you say about her, she has always been hideous.”

“She said all her house-elves were busy all the time, because her _chateau_ couldn’t possibly be left neglected,” Hermione said in a high-pitched mocking tone. “Then I told her that we have no intention of depriving her from the house-elves,” she rolled her eyes, everybody knew she would rather free all the house-elves and hated that she had to take incremental steps, “and that we just want them to be granted a day off every week. And then she had the audacity to say that I couldn’t possibly understand, since I obviously never had to tend to my public image or to preserve a high society position,” she added imitating the witch’s posh accent. “Who does that?”

Draco raised an eyebrow and looked rather pointedly at Pansy, making everybody around them laugh.

“I certainly do not,” Pansy said, looking offended.

“I never said you do,” Draco smirked. “But you have to admit it, you do consider it your job to find a rich husband, so you can reach a high society position and start to tend to your public image.”

“Darling, just because you decided to leave tradition behind, it doesn’t mean I have to.” Pansy smirked.

“That is one tradition I won’t miss,” Draco said, nodding emphatically. “Mother is still trying to arrange a high society marriage bond for me, though,” he grimaced.

Their conversation turned to arranged marriage after that. Hermione had a lot to say on the matter, but Harry was not really interested, so he turned to Ginny, who was telling Seamus and Ron about her last training with the Harpies, and focused on Quidditch for a while.

“So, mate,” Ron said, turning to Harry about an hour after he arrived at the pub. “You left Headquarters early, why were you late?”

“Uh,” Ginny raised her eyes, interested, “were you on a date?” she asked, giving Harry a maniacal grin.

“No,” Harry rolled his eyes. “I went to see your brother at Wheezes. I had an idea, and I thought he was the best person to help me.”

That caught everybody else’s attention.

“An idea about what?” Hermione asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

“I want to develop a spell that prevents a person from being affected by love potions.”

“And why didn’t you ask me?” Hermione asked, looking offended. “I would do anything to help you. You know I would rather you took a different kind of attitude regarding this problem, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t help you and—”

“Hermione,” Harry interrupted her, raising his arms. “Your opinion has nothing to do with the reason I didn’t ask you!”

“Why then?” she asked, frowning.

“Damn, I don’t know,” Harry said sarcastically. “Maybe I thought you were already too busy with the house-elves’ rights movement, or the werewolves’ rights movement, or your job, or you know, your wedding!”

Hermione blushed. Ron snickered. Their wedding had already been rescheduled two times in the past year, both times because of Hermione’s causes. The Weasleys had an ongoing bet on it, and Harry had ten galleons in saying Hermione was going through with it this time around. Muggles say third time’s the charm, after all.

“Right,” she said, exchanging a glance with Ron, “the wedding.”

“Yeah,” Ron grinned, “ _our_ wedding.”

“It wouldn’t change anything regarding our wedding,” Hermione said, but she lacked confidence.

“I sure heard that before,” Ron mumbled, and took a long sip of his drink.

“But why, if I may ask,” Draco said, catching everybody’s attention, and receiving a grateful smile from Hermione, “would you rather go through all the trouble of crafting a new spell instead of using your position in the Auror department to arrest the person trying to dose you?”

“To begin with, we are trying,” Harry said, and Ron nodded.

“It’s illegal to dose someone with a love potion with ill intent, but it’s not illegal to dose someone with a love potion, so if we can’t prove the perpetrator’s intent we can’t arrest them. We would have to catch them _in flagrante delicto_ for the arrest to be valid in court, and to do that, we would have to allow the person to do _their thing_ with the subject...” Ron said, shaking his head. “I hate having to think about work when we are supposed to be chilling out.”

“Even if we could prove the perpetrator’s intent,” Harry said, after nodding his agreement to Ron, “there is no way of tracking the potions to the perpetrator without ingesting them. Well, if it was only one person, we would probably have a better way of tracking them down, but we believe there are multiple unrelated individuals trying to dose me with some kind of love potion. And it’s not just me, you know. I checked the Aurors’ database, and we get a hundred complaints every year regarding usage of love potions, and there is nothing we can do about more than half of them because of the laws.”

“I see,” Draco said, staring into Harry’s eyes intently. What exactly he was seeing, Harry didn’t know, he had lost his train of thought the moment they locked eyes.

“There’s no way it’s only one person,” Ron said, catching Draco’s attention, who released Harry’s eyes. “It has been happening for years. At least since sixth year… I would know,” he grimaced.

“I still think you should be fighting the source of the problem instead of trying to create solutions to the symptoms,” Hermione said, looking at Harry seriously.

“Well, ‘Mione, at least I wouldn’t need to worry so much anymore,” Harry shrugged. “It would be useful.”

“But you shouldn’t need it to begin with!” Hermione exclaimed. “People shouldn’t go around dosing other people with love potions!”

“I agree!” Harry said forcefully, feeling a little annoyed. “But they are doing it! Am I supposed to keep being dosed until people learn how to behave like decent human beings? Because I won’t, Hermione!”

“I never said you should!” Hermione said.

“So, what did George say?” Luna asked after a few moments of uncomfortable silence.

“He is helping me,” Harry shrugged. “But it would be easier if he agreed to stop selling the damn potions.”

“I’ve been telling him that for years,” Hermione said, shaking her head. “Those potions should be illegal! Nothing that takes away people’s free will should be sold that easily.”

Hermione had a point there. The Ministry should regulate the commercialization of love potions in the same way they regulated Veritaserum and Polyjuice. At least it would lower the number of people trying to use them against Harry.

But the Ministry believed that the current laws were good enough. Harry learned that the hard way when he tried to work with the Department of Regulation and Control of Magical Substances, and was told he was overreacting.

“Well, Hermione, I tried that,” Harry sighed, “After the first time it happened I went to the DRCMS, and they completely dismissed me.”

“You really went there?” Hermione asked, sounding surprised.

“Of course I went there,” Harry snorted, “I listen to you, you know?”

“And what did they tell you?”

“That love potions aren’t nearly as dangerous as I was trying to convince the Ministry they are,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. “That anyone can easily resist a love potion, so only the people who already _wanted_ it are affected,” Hermione looked at him, horrified. She went to say something, but Harry raised his hand to stop her. “And the best part is that they heard that I’m able to resist the Imperius Curse, so resisting a love potion can’t possibly be more difficult than that.”

“That is — that is disgusting!” Hermione grunted. “It is victim blaming at its worse! I can’t believe the Ministry would think like that!”

“They get a lot of money to think like that,” Blaise said, raising an eyebrow at her. “After spending so much time working to change the laws that benefit the pure-blood high society, you probably realise that they pay enough to the Ministry every year to keep the laws they like exactly as they are, right?”

“Yeah,” Hermione shrugged, “I know _that_ , I’ve been fighting it for years now… But what does it have to do with the love potions laws?”

“They call it pure-blood culture,” Draco said, with a disgusted look. “They romanticize it because of the characteristic odor of Amortentia and the legend that it smells like the person you love,” he rolled his eyes. “It’s ridiculous. It’s just a poor excuse to ignore how wrong it is that love potions used to be given to force people into valuable arranged marriages, and after the effect passed, they had no way of getting rid of the bond.”

“It was a common practice until very recently,” Pansy said, nodding to Draco. “I believe my grandmother was married to my grandfather like that.”

“That’s even worse!” Hermione said, revolted.

“And that’s without considering what they used to do when one of the parties refused to procreate after a forced bond,” Theo said, shaking his head.

“That’s terrible, forcing people to have sex… It’s rape!” Hermione said, looking distressed. “We have to do something about it,” she added, exchanging a look with Ron. “We need to teach people how wrong it is to use love potions to force other people to consent against their will, if we convince the public we’ll be able to change the laws regarding it, and—”

“And it’s not that simple, Hermione, you know that,” Draco interrupted her. “It would take years to change the public’s perception of the issue, it is a very engrained concept in our society, especially among the pure-bloods. It could possibly be even harder than the werewolves’ rights movement.”

“I know it wouldn’t be immediate, it would take a long time to change people’s minds about something that is so engrained and wrongfully romanticized like that,” Hermione said thoughtfully. “But if we convinced the board of directors to teach sex ed and consent at Hogwarts—”

“Then it would still take a few generations for the laws to be changed, and even then it would be impossible to be sure no one would use love potions in that way. We learned how Dark Magic is bad at Hogwarts, and still...” Draco left the thought unfinished. He didn’t had to explain something that they all knew.

“Maybe,” Hermione nodded, looking thoughtful, “but it would still decrease the usage, and we would be able to properly prosecute anyone who did it. Instead of the current Ministry policy of victim blaming!”

“Oh, I know that look,” Ron sighed, and exchanged a glance with Harry.

“Yeah,” Harry nodded his agreement. “That’s definitely a S.P.E.W. kind of look.”

“You are not going to make us wear badges this time, right?” Ron snickered. “I wouldn’t mind, but I’m guessing the DMLE might have a problem with it.”

“Don’t be silly, Ron,” Hermione said, giving him a playful shrug. “We need a solid approach to this,” she added, back at being serious, taking her notebook and a self-inking quill from her purse, and starting to plan.

“I won’t get married this year, will I?” Ron murmured to Harry when nobody else was paying attention to them.

“Sorry, mate,” Harry said, then added with a reassuring smile, “you know she loves you.”

“But she wants to live in a better world than the one we grew up in, I get it,” Ron sighed, and went to the bar to get the next round.

By the end of the night Hermione had already drafted a five-year plan for her new cause but hadn’t postponed the wedding, so Ron considered it a victory. And Harry started to think about how other people might need his spell, and how he could make it available to them.

He decided to dig into the Aurors’ database to research that as soon as he was back at Headquarters. But now he was tipsy, and he just wanted to go home to sleep.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry spent the next few weeks working with George on his spell. His research using the Aurors’ database had given him even more motivation to pursue his idea. There were too many cases where the victims were either dismissed completely, or actually blamed themselves.

In some cases women were accused of leading on the perpetrator while never intending to go out with them. In others they were told it was their fault for accepting a drink from a strange man, or that they shouldn’t be so provocatively dressed. There was a disturbing case where an underage girl was accused of lying her age and intently putting herself in the situation where she was dosed.

And that was disgusting, so he went around protocol and made copies of the cases for Hermione.

Hermione’s project was also full speed ahead. She had been able to schedule an audience with Hogwarts’ board of directors and was spending most of her time doing research and compiling her case. Other than giving her access to the case files, Harry wasn’t helping her, though.

It was not that Harry didn’t care for Hermione’s ideas, he did care, a lot, if he were to be honest. It was just that her projects were a bit too long term, and he was in need of a more urgent solution. So while Hermione found a way to fit in one more project — Ron joked he thought she might have a hidden time-turner somewhere — Harry dedicated himself to his own shortcut, as Hermione called it, and they were both okay with that.

He and George were working on their first version of the spell when Ron and Hermione arrived at the shop one Saturday afternoon about a month after they started their respective projects.

Harry had spent the night before watching Draco help Hermione rehearse for her presentation for Hogwarts’ board of directors. He had to admit, he had spent more time observing Draco and the way his mouth moved while he talked, than paying attention to Hermione’s speech, but Hermione always had great arguments, and since Draco was helping her with them, she didn’t really need Harry’s input.

She was not looking happy, though.

“The board of directors won’t listen to reason!” Hermione grunted, throwing her purse at a chair in the corner forcefully. “I showed them all my statistics and facts, and they still won’t even consider the idea of a sex ed course! They say it’s against Hogwarts’ ideology!”

“You were not really expecting those retrograde old bats to listen, were you?” George asked, shaking his head. “They refuse to accept pens, Hermione, you really thought they would consider sex ed?”

“I knew it was going to be hard,” Hermione sighed, “but they didn’t even let me talk!”

“You’ll need to approach it differently if you want results,” George shrugged. “Maybe consider convincing the parents before going to the board again. If the parents start sending letters demanding action, the board will have to hear you.”

“That’s...” Hermione looked at George thoughtfully. “That’s actually a great idea.”

“I have some of those from time to time,” George smirked.

“But how do I approach the parents,” Hermione asked, taking her notebook from her purse and starting to pace the storage room.

“The press,” Harry suggested reluctantly.

“Oh, that’s so obvious!” Hermione said, smacking her hand on her forehead. She started to write ideas down.

“It would help us a lot if you just stopped selling love potions, George,” Ron said after a few seconds.

“My love potions have nothing to do with your problem,” George said with a dismissive hand wave.

“Of course they do!” Hermione said, outraged, and stopped writing immediately. “If it weren’t so easy for people to buy love potions, we would have a lot less victims of them. You are basically aiding criminal activity.”

“Hermione, you know as well as I do that selling love potions is not against the law,” George said, looking serious for the first time. “You know I would never help people commit crimes. And my love potions are pretty mild anyway.”

“But George, it doesn’t make any difference that they are not as strong as they could be!” Hermione said emphatically. “They still take away people’s free will! They are still used to rape people!”

“You can’t make me responsible for what people do with my products!” George said, obviously annoyed.

“I can when you are selling dangerous products and not even keeping a database of customers.”

“But—” George started to say, but Hermione interrupted him.

“Don’t even try to say they are easy to resist, or I will forget my diplomacy and punch you in the face.”

“She will,” Ron said, trying not to laugh. He always had fun when Hermione started to scold other people.

“Okay, so maybe they are not as easy to resist as people say they are, but they are still mild—” George started to say but was interrupted again.

“They are not mild if people let them mature,” Ron grimaced. “When these things get older, they get stronger. When it happened to me, I completely lost my mind. I could only think about Romilda Vane, I punched Harry because of her, and I didn’t even know her.”

“Now you tell me, George, what would have happened if Harry was not there to take care of Ron?” Hermione said, putting both hands on her waist, dangerously close to resembling Molly.

“Well, he probably wouldn’t have got poisoned,” George shrugged.

“George,” Harry said, in a warning tone.

“Alright!” George said. “Ron would have gone after Romilda Vane and proclaimed his love for her. But as he was not her target, she would probably have rejected him.”

“But he wouldn’t give up, would he?” Hermione asked.

“No,” George shook his head. “He would keep pursuing her until she accepted him or the potion wore off.”

“So he could even have forced himself on her,” Hermione said, looking disgusted. “And it wouldn’t be his fault, since he was under the influence of a love potion,” and before anyone could say anything she added, ”It wouldn’t be her fault either! They would both be victims! And what if Harry had taken the love potion? What would have happened then, George?”

“Romilda Vane would probably have kissed him—”

“Are you seriously telling me you believe she would have stopped there?” Hermione cut him off, shaking her head, obviously on a roll. “No, she would have kept dosing him. After the first dose, the others are easy because the victim will do anything the perpetrator wants! She could have convinced him to sleep with her! And who knows what else! She could even have got pregnant! And everything against Harry’s will! And that’s only this particular case! I dread imagining what happens to the victims of _your_ potions in the hands of _your_ clients! And—”

“Alright, Hermione!” George interrupted her, raising his arms in a sign of surrender. “I’ll take them off the shelves today and discontinue the line. But I’ll need something to replace revenue. It’s one of my bestselling products.”

“I’ll help you develop something,” Hermione said, calming down and smiling at George kindly, glad to have changed his mind.

“Hermione!” Ron complained. “You can’t keep taking projects! We need to plan our wedding!” Ron shook his head and took a deep breath. “I’ll help George develop a new product. You take care of your other projects. And we are getting married this year!”

Hermione smiled at him fondly, and nodded.

George did as promised and took all the love potions off the shelves and from his catalogue. He had an instant uprise in customers complaints, but he didn’t go back on his word.

Meanwhile he and Harry kept working on their spell. And Harry finally found a way to both make his spell available to other people, and make it profitable for George.

“We can find a way to charm objects to protect the person,” Harry told George. “It will be way easier than having to cast the spell every time the person wants to go out, and there is no risk of forgetting it!”

“And I could sell the charmed objects!” George said, agreeing emphatically. “It wouldn’t be as profitable as selling the potions, but I guess at least it would keep people safe. We could charm bracelets or wristwatches… People will love them.”

“Alright, now we only have to address the problem with the active principle,” Harry said, checking his notes. He had never been so dedicated to something academic before, but he was really enjoying it.

“I think we need to approach the other side of it,” George said, checking his own notes. “You see, we aren’t getting anywhere with the infatuation aspect, so we should approach the diminishment of rational thought. If we succeed, the subject would be conscious after being dosed, would feel compelled to follow the potion’s effects, but would retain the ability to resist. So the potion wouldn't take away the person's free will.”

“Wouldn't that be useless, though, since it would still make the subject want to pursue the potion giver?” Harry asked, doubtful.

“No,” George shook his head. “If the subject is conscious after the potion is activated in their system they are going to be capable of knowing the difference between their real attraction to someone and the effects of the potion, so they would have enough discernment to drink an antidote or leave the environment. If they suddenly feel compelled to kiss a person they never even met, they will be aware enough to know there is something wrong, and conscious enough not to kiss the person, rendering the love potion useless. The sudden infatuation wouldn't be enough to take away the subject's free will.”

“I was really hoping we could find a way to not even feel the sudden infatuation,” Harry said thoughtfully.

“I don’t think we would be able to achieve it as easily as we can achieve protecting the subject’s free will, especially if we want to charm an amulet with it. But at least it would be actually easy to resist a love potion, and isn’t that the real problem with it? The lack of consent? This way the subject would only do what they actually want to,” George rationalized.

“Ah, so you finally admit that it’s not easy to resist?” Harry asked, raising his eyebrows to George.

“You convinced me,” George snorted as they went back to work.

 

~~x~~

 

It took them a few more months, just as George had predicted, because whenever they thought they had a solid spell, something went wrong. They finally found the exact ingredient properties they needed to counter, and the counterspells that could properly do it. Harry had no idea that crafting a spell was such a hard work, but he was not giving up on it.

It had been four months since Harry first had the idea when George and he charmed their first prototype. It was a simple, Muggle wristwatch. They didn’t want to use a magical one, so the charms on the watch wouldn’t interact with the spell. They chose a watch because Harry would be able to use it every day without anyone questioning it.

“We could produce different types of objects for each person’s needs,” George said, observing their prototype proudly. “So no one would know which object is the charm. And we can even charge a little extra for personalized amulets…”

“I will let you think about the commercial aspects of it,” Harry said with a dismissive hand wave.

If he could, he would go around teaching the spell for free, but he knew that wouldn’t be particularly fair to George. He had stopped selling one of his most profitable products and spent months working with Harry on the charms when he could’ve be working on more profitable things. Harry couldn’t ask him to make the spell public knowledge.

“Now we only need to do all the tests and submit the results to the Ministry,” George said.

“Tests? You never mentioned any tests.”

“Well, theoretically it works, but magic tends to subvert theory sometimes. And if we were only doing this for you, we wouldn’t really need to register it, though Percy would probably throw both of us in Azkaban if we didn’t. But to commercialize it we need a patent from the Ministry, and to get a patent we have to comply with all their requirements.”

“What kind of tests do we need to do?” Harry asked, worried.

“Just the basics. If it works properly and if it won’t harm the person who wears it… Of course harm is a really loose concept for the Ministry, as you already know.”

Harry nodded. As an Auror he had first-hand experience with all the ways the Ministry’s concept of harm was lacking. “What do we need to do?”

“Record our finds with at least three different test subjects. You and I, as creators, are not eligible as test subjects,” George said.

“Why not?” Harry frowned.

“Apparently we could fake the results we are hoping to achieve. I still don’t see how the Ministry supposedly prevents us from paying another person to fake our initial results for us, but what can we do, right?”

“Initial results?” Harry asked.

“They do their own set of tests before granting the patent,” George shrugged. “I have to be fair, they don’t take too much time to expedite the patent after we submit the application. But it has to be perfect.”

“So, we need to find three people to be test subjects?” Harry asked, already dreading the idea of having to ask his friends. “What else do the test subjects need to do?”

“We’ll need to dose them with a love potion and observe their reactions. Then they just sign a protocol saying they observed the effects we described on our application. Pretty straightforward thing.”

“Right,” Harry nodded. “And who is going to test it for us, if we can’t test it ourselves.”

“That’s a little harder,” George said, shaking his head. “I remember when we first started the _Wonder Witch Love Potions Line_ , finding someone willing to be dosed with a love potion is a pain in the arse. But I already have two people willing to do it.”

“Really?” Harry asked a little shocked.

“Well, they owe me favours. And I guaranteed them we would do it in private, so they wouldn’t be humiliated if the testing went wrong. But you need to find someone else. My usual testers are not willing to be dosed for this.”

“Yeah,” Harry nodded. “I can understand it. I’ll see if I can find someone.”

Harry knew he would have trouble finding a volunteer. But he threw it out for discussion at the next pub night anyway, because if none of his friends were willing to be dosed, he had no idea who else he could ask.

“I already told George when he asked me, I don’t ever want to be under the influence of that kind of potion again in my life,” Ron grimaced.

“That’s okay, Ron,” Harry sighed.

“You would be the one giving the potion to the tester?” Hermione asked.

“Either me or George. Whoever the tester is more comfortable with,” Harry shrugged.

“Neither,” Hermione said categorically. “From what you told me, I would still have the feeling of being in love with you or George. I really don’t want to put our friendship through that…”

Harry sighed again. He could understand it. He wouldn’t want to have the feeling of being in love with her or Ron either. Everything would be too weird afterwards.

“Sorry, mate, but I don’t fancy the idea of feeling anything else for you,” Seamus said, and Dean agreed emphatically.

“Really, you have no idea,” Ron said, shaking his head. “I never saw Romilda Vane in the same way again, and I didn’t even know her beforehand!” He gave a disgusted shudder.

One by one, all of his friends refused to be dosed to test his charm. Harry expected it, but he was still disappointed. He wanted to fulfill the Ministry’s requirements as soon as possible, so people would be able to use his charm to protect themselves.

“I’m sure you’ll find someone willing to do it to help you. There are loads of people who would do anything for you,” Ron said, giving Harry a pat on the back, when everybody else’s attention was on Luna’s new theory for the effects of merpeoples’ mating sounds on patients with Spattergroit — sometimes Harry had no idea how she had ended up as an Unspeakable.

Only Draco seemed to still be paying attention to Harry. He was frowning a little, as he did every time Harry said something, and the only reason Harry knew that was because he was always paying attention to Draco.

“I just didn’t want to ask any of them, you know,” Harry said. “I mean, they could actually lie about their results just to try to make a move.”

“Yeah,” Ron agreed, taking a sip of his pint, “maybe someone from the office?”

“Robards would skin me alive if I even tried.” Harry rolled his eyes.

“George already asked everybody from the family,” Ron said thoughtfully. “Who else do we know? Your old quidditch team? Oliver or Alicia would probably do it.”

“I don’t think they would, but I will ask anyway.” Harry took a long sip of his pint. “Maybe George is luckier than me and finds someone else first.”

“Let’s hope he is,” Ron said, nodding emphatically.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry’s head was pounding when he woke up the next morning. He didn’t remember having so much to drink the night before, but he was obviously hung over. He stood up and took a hangover cure from his medicine cabinet. He felt better immediately, but the pounding didn’t stop. He looked around feeling confused. The pounding didn’t seem to come from inside his head, though, it sounded like it was coming from his living room.

He felt stupid when he finally realized someone was knocking at the door and ran to open it before whomever it was gave up.

“Do you always answer your door half naked?” Draco asked while Harry was looking at him in shock. He had never expected to see Draco on his doorstep, especially not on a Saturday morning while Harry was still hung over. “You have no manners, Potter? You are supposed to invite me in.”

Harry looked to his living room over his shoulder for a second. His shoes were in the middle of the room, where he had left them the night before. There was a pile of clothes on his armchair and old takeaway boxes on the table. For a second he considered shutting the door in Draco’s face.

“Yeah,” Harry said, shaking the awkwardness and stepping away from the door to allow Draco entry. “Come in, Malfoy.”

Draco rolled his eyes but still walked into Harry’s flat.

“So, why are you here?” Harry asked, turning his back to Draco, fishing a shirt from where he had thrown it on the sofa the night before, and putting it on.

When he turned back to Draco, he looked a little flushed, but Harry had no idea why.

“I was under the impression you required some assistance with your project?” Draco asked, raising one eyebrow.

“But last night you said you wouldn’t,” Harry said, frowning, feeling a little confused.

“I never said anything, if you care to remember properly. I only listened to everybody else’s reasoning not to and decided none of them apply to me.”

Harry tried to remember everybody’s reasons not to help him from the night before. And Draco was right, he had never said anything.

“But why would you want to help me?” Harry asked, still frowning.

“I would not be only helping you,” Draco said, gazing into Harry’s eyes. “As it happens, my mother is still invested in arranging a marriage bond for me. And I would rather have a choice if she decided to change tactics.”

“Oh, I see,” Harry said, staring at Draco, unable to take his eyes away.

With all the talk about arranged marriage and forced bonds Harry should have realised that there was still the possibility of being dosed with a love potion when it came to the pure-blood high society.

“Do you really think your mother would do that?” Harry asked, a little taken aback. He would never have thought Narcissa would do anything like that against Draco’s will. He didn’t know her very well, but he knew she would do anything in the world to take care of her son.

“No, I don’t think she would,” Draco sighed. “But you know she would do _anything_ if she thought it was the best for me. And I know she thinks a good marriage could help us.”

“Why don’t you?” Harry asked, curious.

“Why don’t I _what_?”

“Why don’t you marry some pure-blood rich girl, like your mother wants you to?” Harry asked, feeling a little stupid.

“Why don’t _you_ marry Ginny and have a handful of ginger babies like everybody in the world wants you to?” Draco shot back sarcastically, looking annoyed. “I don’t know, Potter. Maybe I would like to make my own choices for once in my life. I thought you, of all people, would understand that.”

“I do,” Harry said, looking away, embarrassed. “I’m sorry. It was a stupid thing to ask.”

“It was, but never mind that,” Draco said with a dismissive hand wave. “What is it you need me to do, then?”

“Just drink some potions, and say if the charm is working. If it works you are supposed to feel attracted to the person who gave you the potion, but still keep your rational thought and—”

“Yeah, Potter, I know,” Draco interrupted him. “I heard you and Hermione talking about it yesterday. I want to know what I need to do _after_ taking the potion.”

“Oh,” Harry hesitated. Of course Draco knew the expected effects of the charm already; he was there last night. “Right. You’ll just have to sign a form saying it works. Pretty straightforward.”

“Alright,” Draco nodded, looking at Harry intensely. “When do you want to start?”

“I’ll tell George you are volunteering and—”

“No,” Draco said, sounding resolute. “I’m not doing this in front of Weasley. If your charm doesn’t work he would be more than willing to humiliate me, just for the laugh, and you know it. The only way I’m doing it is if you are the one administering the potion.”

Harry had not expected that. He had no idea Draco would trust him that way. But that wasn’t even the weird part: the really weird thing was that Draco was going to willingly take a potion he knew would make him feel attracted to Harry.

“You know you will feel—” Harry started to say, but Draco interrupted him again.

“After you and Ronald started trying to dry the Leaky’s firewhisky reservoir last night, I asked Hermione everything she knows about your charm,” Draco said, raising an eyebrow at Harry. “I know exactly everything you are expecting me to feel.”

“And you still want _me_ to dose you, even knowing how you’ll feel.”

“It won’t make any difference whatsoever,” Draco said, looking sure of it. “If you are so reluctant to take my help, I can just withdraw the offer, Potter. I assumed you were desperate.”

“I am,” Harry said, nodding. “All right. I don’t have everything here. You can meet me at the shop—”

“I’m not being dosed at the shop either,” Draco interrupted him again. “I’d rather not make a spectacle of myself in a public place if your charm doesn’t work. Your flat,” Draco paused, wrinkled his nose, and looked pointedly at the pile of clothes on Harry’s armchair, “will have to do.”

“Sure,” Harry rolled his eyes, “we can do it here. Maybe we can do it tomorrow?” he asked, passing his fingers through his hair, suddenly feeling nervous.

“I have a previous engagement tomorrow. I’ll be available next Tuesday after work.”

“Sure, whatever works for you.”

Draco took another look around Harry’s living room, snorted, and turned his back on Harry to leave.

“I’ll see you on Tuesday,” he said, walking away.

Harry closed the door and leaned against it, sighing. Draco was the solution to his problem. But he seemed to be a very demanding solution.

 

~~x~~

 

Sunday lunches at the Burrow used to be one of Harry’s favorite things in the world, until everybody else started marrying and having kids. Most of the time it didn’t make any difference. Ron and Hermione never really acted like other couples did, at least not around Harry. People still saw them as a trio, and not as a couple plus a friend. But now sometimes at the Burrow Harry felt a little lonely.

He knew no one intended to make him feel like that, and everybody was always including him. But after he and Ginny broke up and Ginny started bringing Luna for Sunday lunch, he started feeling awkward.

When he arrived at the Burrow that Sunday, Ginny and Luna were outside in the garden. Luna liked to talk to the gnomes, and Ginny liked to indulge her. He waved at them and entered the kitchen, where Molly was just as busy as always. She stopped for a minute to hug him and sent him away.

“People love collectables!” Ron was saying emphatically when Harry arrived at the living room. He was standing up in front of the sofa, gesticulating wildly to George and Hermione, who were seated on the sofa, looking at him and nodding.

“There are already a good number of collectables on the market, Ron,” George said, resting his chin on his hand. “We have the chocolate frog cards, the war heros figurines from _Bewitched Toys_ … Do you really think there is space on the market for another historical figures collectable?”

“Of course!” Ron said, looking enthusiastic, raising his hands. “It’s not about the historical figures, well, it is, but while these other companies are focusing on the good things people did, we should focus on the stupid aspects of historical people’s lives.”

“I’m listening,” George said, looking at Ron intensively.

“Harry’s figurine could say his hair always grows back less than 24 hours after someone tries to cut it,” Ron said, looking excited about his new idea.

“Yours could say you took off an arm from a Viktor Krum figurine because you were jealous,” Harry snorted, catching their attention.

“We can think about what we’ll write on them later,” George said, laughing.

Harry sat with them, and listened to Ron’s other ideas for a while.

“We can use a variation of a translating spell to make a sweet that makes anyone who eats it only speak in another language for some time,” Ron said, grinning.

“That would be great for international relations,” Hermione said, nodding. “People usually have trouble casting translating spells and—”

“Yeah, sure, there is a niche there, but can you imagine if one student slipped a teacher one of these?” George said, smiling mischievously.

“I also have ideas for some card games,” Ron said, checking a piece of parchment he took from his pocket.

“We can go through them later, little brother,” George said, smiling at Ron fondly. “You would do good working with me full time, you know?”

“I like being an Auror,” Ron shrugged. “Some of the laws are bonkers, and sometimes the job is really stupid. But I like it when we get to real criminals.”

“Come work with me when you get tired of all that.” George winked at him, and turned to Harry. “What about you, Harry, want to leave the force to join the fun?”

“Not today, George,” Harry said with a half-smile. “But I did find someone to test our charm.”

“You did?” George asked, raising his eyebrows. “Ron said none of your friends wanted to. But never mind that. I was thinking we can use the rest of the _Wonder Witch Love Potions Line_ that I have in stock.”

“You were supposed to dispose of those,” Hermione said, frowning at George.

“They cost me money, Hermione, I can’t just throw them in the bin,” George rolled his eyes. “But I’m not selling, nor using them for anything other than tests and experiments.”

“Yeah, so I’ll do the tests on Tuesday, on my flat,” Harry said, before Hermione could say something else. “I’ll go by the shop tomorrow to pick up the potions.”

“Alright, I’ll get you the forms too,” George nodded, then looked at Hermione sideways. “I think I can hear Angelina calling me outside,” he said, leaving the room in a hurry.

“He already took them from the shelves, ‘Mione,” Ron said, sitting on the sofa’s arm by her side and patting her shoulder. “Cut him some slack.”

Hermione sighed, then turned to Harry and asked, “Who is going to test it for you?”

Harry didn’t really want to tell her. Somehow the whole thing with Draco at his flat the morning before felt private. But before he could make something up, Molly showed up in the living room with a determined look on her face.

“I finally have you here,” she said, grabbing Hermione by the arm and directing her to the kitchen, “and you still didn’t tell me about the Muggle traditions you want to include in the wedding.”

Hermione grimaced, but followed Molly to the kitchen.

“I gather your wedding is still on?” Harry said grinning to Ron, and feeling thankful for the chance to change the subject.

“Thank Merlin for that,” Ron said, smiling wildly. “People were starting to say she doesn’t want to marry me.”

“Skeeter can barely be considered people, Ron.”

 

~~x~~

 

Draco was late. Well, sort of. Harry was expecting Draco to go to his flat right after work, so Harry practically ran away from the Ministry as soon as his shift ended in order to have some time to tidy up the place a little before Draco arrived.

He threw away the boxes from last night’s take out, picked up the clothes that were on his armchair, and sent the teacups, that he always forgot in the living room, to the kitchen. He even had time to _Scourgify_ the dust from the tv stand. But Draco didn’t show up.

So Harry sat on his sofa and turned on the telly. He shouldn’t be feeling disappointed like that, Draco would probably show up a little later than Harry had expected, no big deal. Except for the fact that the whole thing was a little weird.

Harry had no idea why Draco had volunteered to help him. It was one thing to be afraid his parents would resort to love potions to make him marry someone of their choosing; It was a whole other thing to volunteer to be dosed with love potions that would make him feel attracted to Harry.

Did Draco still hate Harry so much that the fake feeling of being in love with Harry, and the disgust that would certainly come afterwards, wouldn’t make any kind of difference for him? That would explain why Draco was always so distant with Harry, while he was friendly with everybody else, even Ron.

But he shouldn’t feel so upset about it. Draco had more than enough reason to hate him for the rest of their lives. In fact, Harry had just as much reasons to hate Draco, but he had decided to leave the past behind. He supposed that a person like Draco couldn’t do that. Pansy was always saying Draco had an incredible capacity to hold grudges, after all.

And really, it made sense that he would end up friends with everyone but Harry. None of the others had almost killed Draco. And despite the fact that Draco had almost killed Ron, he apologised, something Harry had never done about the _Sectumsempra_ incident.

Maybe it was his fault that he and Draco were not friendly. He thought it was obvious that he was sorry, and he had saved Draco time and time again during the war, after all. But maybe Draco just needed him to say the words.

A knock on the door interrupted Harry’s thoughts.

He stood up and took a deep breath before opening the door, wishing his previous thoughts away. It wouldn’t do to be around Draco while thinking about all the reasons they had to hate each other.

“I thought you weren’t coming,” Harry said, while signing for Draco to enter the flat.

“Well, Potter, I fail to see why you would think that, since I said I was coming,” Draco said, walking into the living room and looking around.

“Of course,” Harry mumbled, closing the door and feeling embarrassed. “Would you like some tea before we start?” he asked, not knowing what kind of pleasantries were expected in this kind of situation.

“I’d rather go straight to business if you don’t mind.”

Draco was standing in the middle of the living room with his hands shoved in his robes pockets. He looked so out of place in Harry’s flat that everything felt like a weird dream. And for some reason, Harry’s heart refused to settle down.

“If that’s what you prefer,” Harry shrugged and picked out the wristwatch and the first potion they were going to try from his rucksack. “Now, the amulet will activate the spell the moment it identifies the love potion’s key ingredients in your system. We are going to start with _Crush Blush_ from the Wheezes’ _Wonder Witch Line._ It’s the weakest of the bunch, and usually has a mild infatuation effect. The dosed person is expected to compliment the giver of the potion, and declare infatuation,” he read from the potion label.

Harry gave the wristwatch to Draco and went to the kitchen to fetch a glass of water. He needed to keep himself calm. The spells on the amulet were going to work exactly as they were supposed to, they would finish the tests quickly, and then he wouldn’t need to watch Draco looking all posh and wizard-like in the middle of his mostly Muggle living room anymore, nor he would have to acknowledge what that image was doing to him.

When Harry walked back into the living room, Draco had his neck crooked and was reading the titles of Harry’s books in the bookcase. Most of the books were on defense techniques and legal methods of incarceration, that he still had from his Auror training days. But he also had some embarrassing Muggle romance novels, and he really didn’t want Draco to see those.

Harry cleared his throat, startling Draco a little.

“You have an interesting book collection here, Potter,” Draco smirked, raising one eyebrow at Harry.

“Hermione is always giving me books. I don’t always read them…” Harry said, feeling his cheeks getting warmer. “You have the watch on your wrist? And I’ll have to take notes if that’s okay with you?” he asked quickly, trying to change the subject.

Draco only rolled his eyes but showed the watch. “You can dose me now, Potter.”

Harry nodded, pouring the recommended amount of potion in the water, and activating it with a spell. He passed the glass to Draco and held his breath.

“Cheers,” Draco said sarcastically, raising the glass before drinking its contents.

At first, nothing changed. Harry and Draco had their eyes locked onto each others’, and Harry was supposed to be looking for any changes or signs of the potion’s effect. But in reality he was a little lost in Draco’s silver irises. Draco’s eyes looked like melted silver, so warm somehow. And then they changed. His eyes got glassy and unfocused.

“Your eyes are so green!” Draco said. His voice had lost its usual sarcastic tone. “How can your eyes be so green? They are so beautiful!” Draco said, taking a step forward and stretching his arm in Harry’s direction, as if he wanted to touch Harry’s face.

The amulet was not working. That much was obvious to Harry. But he had no idea why.

“You are upset about something,” Draco said, still staring into Harry’s eyes, and tilting his head, looking exactly like a confused puppy. “Why are you upset? You only frown like that when you are upset. You were always frowning in sixth year, and I felt so guilty because I was the one making you frown.”

Harry closed his eyes for a second. Draco sounded so real and so caring. As if he had paid close attention to Harry’s expressions back in sixth year. Harry shook his head. He knew it was not real, it was just the potion making Draco say things he didn’t really feel. Harry took the glass from Draco’s hand, vanished the remains of the potion, and then poured the antidote he retrieved from his rucksack.

“Here, Draco,” Harry said, putting the glass in Draco’s outstretched hand. “Just drink this and I won’t be upset anymore” he added with a weak smile.

Draco drank the antidote enthusiastically, as if making Harry not feel upset anymore was his great goal in life. The antidote worked faster than the potion, and in less than two seconds, Draco’s eyes were back in focus.

“It didn’t work,” Harry said, as he made a note on which potion he used, the amount, and the result.

“I noticed,” Draco grunted, looking sour.

“Can I try something?” Harry asked, not wanting to cast a spell on the watch while on his wrist without Draco’s agreement.

Draco just nodded, so Harry did a wipe spell on the watch. Maybe there was some other spell interfering with it. He knew that if that were the case he and George would have to find a solution for the interference anyway, but at least it was better than the other option, that the amulet just didn’t work.

“It’s okay if we try again?” Harry asked, and Draco nodded again. “This one is the _Cupid Crystals,_ ” he said, picking up the next bottle, “it also causes infatuation, but it’s a little stronger than the first one. George used to market this as ideal for Valentine’s Day,” he added, reading the label. “It says it’s guaranteed that the dosed person will ask the giver on a date.”

“Marvelous,” Draco snorted. “Exactly what I wanted, to ask you on a date,” he added sarcastically.

“You don’t need to do it if you don’t want,” Harry said seriously. “You can stop whenever you want.”

“I’m not quitting, Potter, just give me the damn potion.”

Harry did as he was told. Poured the potion in the glass with water, activated it, and handed it to Draco. Harry could see the exact moment the potion took over.

“You are so handsome. Every time you laugh I get completely astonished. I’m always so afraid you’ll realise I get stupid when I’m around you.” Draco’s eyes were wild and his cheeks flushed.

It felt so good to hear that, so heartwarming. But Harry only felt it for a second, because as he realised Draco didn't really feel that way about him, a cold feeling crept down his spine.

“Do you want to go out with me? I know a great restaurant in London, it’s a mix of magical and Muggle, and I think you would love the food,” Draco said, smiling a little insipidly.

Harry wanted to say yes. He wanted to go out with Draco, to have dinner at a great restaurant, maybe have some drinks after... But he knew it was all a lie. He couldn’t let the potion fool him into believing Draco felt any of those things. He vanished the potion and poured the antidote again.

“I’ll answer you in a minute, just drink this first.”

Draco took the glass from Harry eagerly and gulped the whole thing in a single swig. Draco’s eyes went back to their usual size, but the blush on his face didn’t recede. Harry made note of everything, only omitting Draco’s name.

“Maybe this one didn't work because the potion has a compulsory spell built into it.” Even while Harry said it, he knew it was not true. George had accounted for the compulsory spell they included in some of their potions, and their charm was supposed to counter that. But Harry didn’t want to give up yet.

“It’s possible,” Draco said, looking away from Harry.

“Can we try another one?”

Draco just shrugged. So Harry picked up the next potion and started the process again.

“The next one is _Flirting Fancies,_ it makes the dosed person flirt with everyone in their proximity. There is no need to activate it,” Harry said, feeling nervous while handing Draco the glass.

The blush in Draco’s face darkened, and he narrowed his eyes, looking at Harry with obvious lust.

“Auror training really did wonders to your body,” Draco said, licking his lips. “You look so strong, and so sexy now. I have to admit, you were also beautiful when you were a scrawny teenager, but look at you now! So fit!”

Draco looked at him with so much lust that Harry blushed and his heart started racing. He needed to keep himself under control, as he knew from personal experience that Draco would remember everything after he took the antidote, and Harry didn’t want Draco to remember him like that.

“Here,” he said, handing him the glass with the antidote once again, “just drink this and we can keep talking.”

Draco’s eyes refocused, but he was still blushing.

“You don’t have an excuse for this one not working, do you?” Draco asked, raising an eyebrow to Harry.

“I don’t,” Harry sighed, “but maybe we should try another, from a different type, so I can know for sure that none of them work. There are only two types left.”

“Sure, Potter, dose me again,” Draco said, rolling his eyes.

“You can say no if you don’t want to,” Harry said, feeling bad, Draco was obviously on edge. “I have enough data to try and fix the problem already.”

“No, let’s test another one, you need all the information you can get,” Draco said, without looking at Harry.

Harry prepared the glass, and handed it to Draco: “This one is _Heartbreak Teardrops_. It’s supposed to be the most realistic one. Makes the dosed person say anything they can to convince the giver that their love is real.”

Harry felt anxious while Draco drank it. This was the worst one, and it was the bestselling potion in the shop, because most people wanted everything to feel realistic.

“I love you, Potter,” Draco said, staring straight into Harry’s eyes.

The physical changes were more subtle than with the other potions, and if it were not for the lack of warmth in Draco’s eyes, Harry could be fooled into thinking the amulet worked.

“You don’t, Draco, you are under the effect of a love potion, remember?” Harry tried. Maybe if he pushed Draco’s consciousness into working, the amulet would have some effect.

“No, Potter, this is not some love potion effect, I just love you so much!” Draco said, stepping in Harry’s direction. “I’ve always loved you, how can you not see it? Why else would I be here? Why else would I go against my family to try and save you from the Dark Lord? Why would I tell my friends not to kill you on the Room of Hidden Things? I love you!”

Every single thing Draco said made so much sense. Harry had never understood why Draco lied to his father when they captured Harry during the war, and now Draco was saying that it was because he was in love with Harry, and that would explain everything, wouldn’t it?

But it was not real, and it didn’t make sense, Harry thought, shaking his head and trying to keep it clear. It was not real; It was just the potion’s effects. But still, every time Draco declared his love for Harry, it felt like a stab to his chest. It was almost unbearable to hear all that, knowing it was not true.

“I,” Harry hesitated, his heart was aching, “I know, Draco. Just drink this, please, for me,” Harry said, giving Draco the glass, and his hands were shaking.

When Draco emerged back from the effects of the potion, he was trembling and wouldn’t stop fidgeting.

“Do you still want to try the other one?” Harry asked, fearfully. He was not sure what he wanted Draco to say.

“What's the point? It obviously isn't working. It must be something wrong with your charm work,” Draco said, without looking at Harry. He turned and left the apartment. A few seconds later Harry could hear the soft pop of Draco Disapparating.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry had no idea why the charm hadn’t worked. Since Draco left the night before, he had looked at all his notes, he had checked and double checked his charm work, but he still couldn’t find anything wrong. It didn’t make any sense. Everything seemed to be exactly as it should.

And he couldn’t stop thinking about what that last potion had made Draco say. It sounded so real, and addressed things that had always confused Harry so much. If he thought a little too much about Draco before all that, he had to admit that he could barely think of anything else now.

He was about to leave the Auror Headquarters to go to Wheezes and talk to George when he saw that Ron was still at his desk. That was not something that happened often, as Ron was always one of the first to leave after a stressful shift like that one. But there he was, and he didn’t look okay.

“You alright, Ron?” Harry asked, walking towards Ron’s desk.

“Yeah, Harry, sure,” Ron said, without looking at Harry.

“Really, Ron, what’s going on?” Harry asked, sitting on the chair in front of Ron’s desk.

“I don’t think Hermione wants to marry me,” Ron said, looking up from his files. His eyes were rimmed red, and he looked tired.

“What happened?” Harry asked quietly. He had the same impression from the way Hermione had been acting since the first time she postponed the wedding, but he had been thinking it was only cold feet.

“Nothing actually happened,” Ron shook his head and bit his lip. “She is just not interested, at all. I think she just doesn’t know how to break things off with me.”

“That’s not right,” Harry said. He had no idea how to deal with the situation, but he couldn’t just abandon his best mate when he was thinking like that. “Hermione loves you, I know she does.”

“I don’t know, mate,” Ron sighed. “We were talking yesterday, she didn’t sound excited at all about the wedding.”

“She is really busy with everything else, Ron, she was probably focused on one of her projects.”

Ron sighed again, and shook his head. “I love how dedicated she is to her projects. I just wanted her to be a little more happy about getting married to me.”

“Ron, I—”

“That’s okay, mate,” Ron interrupted him, raising a hand. “I think I just need some time to think about everything.” He stood up, picked up his things, and started to walk towards the exit. “I think I’m going to sleep at the Burrow today. If mum asks I can just say I’d rather write my bonding vows in private, and that I don’t want Hermione to see it yet.”

Ron left Headquarters with his head down, and Harry felt bad for having no idea how he could help his best friend.

Because of his conversation with Ron, Harry almost changed his mind about going to Wheezes to talk to George about the results of the tests. But he knew there was nothing he could do for Ron other than worry himself by at home, and he needed to find out what was wrong with the charm.

Harry arrived at Wheezes shortly after that and told George everything, only omitting Draco’s name.

“I don't understand it, Harry, it worked perfectly fine with both of my test subjects,” George said, shaking his head, and looking at Harry’s notes. “Did you check to see if your test subject had some other spell interfering with it?”

“I tested it, it still didn't work,” Harry sighed. “We have to make it work with other spells anyway. We can't have it failing because of outside interference.”

“I know,” George said, nodding. “But we need to understand why it doesn't work with your test subject first. Or all this work will be for nothing.”

“Maybe we did something wrong when we were casting on this one,” Harry said, raising the wristwatch to eye level and analysing it.

“I don’t think so, we double-checked all the spell work after casting. But maybe we should test again, maybe something interfered with this one in particular,” George said, and started to run diagnostic spells on the amulet. “The blocker is on the right settings, and is subject to the right parameters,” he said, comparing his notes with the information he was getting from the spell, “all the conditionals are aligned, and are in the right order too. Maybe we did something different with the other two?”

“I doubt that,” Harry said, shaking his head. But he still picked up their other two prototypes and ran the same diagnostic spells that George had run on the first one. “They all have the exact same stats. There is probably something conditional with my test subject or to the environment where I’m doing the test.”

“Either way we need to figure it out,” George shrugged. “I told you Harry, sometimes we do everything right, and magic just doesn’t do what it was supposed to. We’ll need to double-check all the spells we used and find out if any of them have a wider conditional setting than the one we considered.”

“So, more research?” Harry grimaced.

“More research,” George nodded.

They had been in the storage room, researching their spells for a couple of hours when Hermione arrived at the shop.

She didn’t look well: Her hair was untidy, and she couldn’t stop fidgeting. Her hands kept moving from her purse, to her hair, to her pockets, and back again.

“Hey, Harry,” Hermione greeted, without really looking at him. “George, I was wondering if you could give me your love potions’ recipes? I want to add a study on the active principle on them to my case on why they should be reclassified as Class-C Non-Tradable Substances.”

“Sure, Hermione,” George said, exchanging a worried glance with Harry, “I just have to look on the files,” he added, leaving the storage room and going upstairs.

“Hermione, you alright?” Harry asked as soon as they were alone in the storage room.

She sighed, and ran her hand over her face, but didn’t answer. Harry thought he knew exactly why she was so distressed, and although he didn’t want to pry, he couldn’t just watch his two best friends suffer like that.

“What’s the matter? It’s the wedding, innit?” Harry asked, getting closer to her, and resting his hand on her shoulder.

“Harry, I—” she sobbed, “I love Ron, you know I do. I've been in love with him since we were 14. But—” she stopped, and Harry could see that her eyes were sparkling with unshed tears.

“It’s okay, Hermione, you can tell me whatever it is,” Harry said, squeezing her shoulder in a way he hoped was comforting.

“I don’t want to lose myself, Harry,” Hermione said, looking up to him. “I don't want to lose my identity. I don't want to be just another Weasley, there are so many Weasleys already!” Her eyes were wide, and she seemed to be hyperventilating. “I... I don't want to be like Molly, or my mum, and give up on myself to become someone else's wife. I don't want to be just another Mrs Weasley. This is so selfish!”

“Hermione, there is nothing selfish in this,” Harry said, trying to sound reassuring. “It's completely reasonable. And you should tell Ron. He wouldn't mind at all! He loves you, he is not expecting you to change who you are. No one expects you to become Molly, no one expects you to give up your career in order to have a bunch of babies! Ron loves you, he'll understand. For him it's way worse to think that you don't want to marry him because you don't love him anymore or something like that.”

“He is thinking that?” Hermione asked, and her tears finally started to run down her cheeks. “I never wanted him to think that!”

“What else could he be thinking, ‘Mione?” Harry asked, patting her shoulder, trying to be as gentle as possible. “You postponed the wedding twice, you are not even trying to help them plan the wedding this time around…”

“I’m just overwhelmed! And afraid!” Hermione took a deep breath. “I'm so afraid, Harry. I'm so afraid I won't know what to do, how to be a good wife for him without losing myself.”

“You’ve been living together for the past two years, no one expects anything to change because of the wedding.”

“But being married is supposed to be different. I—” she hesitated, so Harry patted her shoulder again. “Before I postponed the wedding the first time, Molly asked to have a talk with me in private, and tried to teach me how to cook some of Ron's favorite meals... I don't know how to cook, Harry. I can't learn how to do Ron's favorite dishes.” The tears didn’t stop running down her face, and her lips were trembling.

“I don’t think he expects you to,” Harry said, pulling Hermione into a hug. “And you know how Molly is, remember how she got when Ginny and I broke up, or when Ginny said she wanted to be a Quidditch player, or even better, when Ginny first took Luna to the Burrow as her girlfriend.”

Hermione let out a sob that sounded close to a giggle.

“Molly is a great person, and she is the closest to a mum I’ve had, but she is quite a bit retrograde,” Harry said, shaking his head fondly. “She ended up warming up to everything Ginny wanted to do with her life. She won't judge you for not cooking for Ron. And if she does, well, she'll get used to it eventually.”

 

~~x~~

 

Hermione and Ron were not at the Leaky the next Friday. Hermione had sent Harry a Patronus Message earlier telling him that she and Ron were going out to talk. Harry wished they could solve their problems. Over the years he had got stuck in countless arguments between the two of them, but this time around it was not a silly disagreement, and they had to talk about it.

Harry was the first to arrive at the pub, so he took his notes from his rucksack and started to look for the problem with the charm work again. He hadn’t had time the day before, since the Aurors had busted an organization that was smuggling dark artefacts into the country. They had spent months studying the organization, and the night before, their undercover agent gave the signal for them to move in. They arrested the whole group, but Harry only got home, exhausted, in the wee hours of the morning.

So Harry still had no idea what was wrong with the charm and why it was not working with Draco. But he was not going to give up. He picked up a book about outside interference with trigger-activated spells and started to read it. He really hated research.

“That’s something we don’t see everyday.” Theo’s voice made Harry look up from the book.

Draco and Theo were sitting across from Harry. He hadn’t heard them arrive.

“One of the prototypes for the charm to repel the effects of love potions is not working properly,” Harry shrugged. “We are trying to figure out why.”

“ _One_ of them is not working, how many did you produce?” Theo asked, sounding interested. Just like Hermione, he couldn’t avoid getting interested in this type of problem.

Draco, on the other hand, didn’t seem to want to look in Harry’s direction. He kept his eyes on the entrance, as if wishing that someone else would show up so he would not have to join the conversation.

“Three, as it’s the standard practice for applying for patents,” Harry said, running his fingers through his hair. “The other two worked perfectly fine, and we tested all of them with the same potions.”

That caught Draco’s attention.

“Have you checked if all three of them have the same settings?” Theo asked, leaning forward a little.

Harry and Theo spent a long time talking about Harry’s charm, so long that everybody else arrived, and started talking about other things around them, except Draco. He was still not looking in Harry’s direction, but Harry could tell he was paying attention to his conversation with Theo.

“I don’t know what else to suggest, Harry,” Theo said, shaking his head, some time later. “I would have to disassemble the whole charm to be able to help you more… And I would do it, but I really don’t have time now.”

“Don’t worry,” Harry said with a hand wave, “we’ll figure it out.”

Harry was sure they would figure it out eventually, but he was not sure Draco would be willing to keep helping him. He had reacted badly after the last potion they tried, and Harry had no idea if he would submit himself to the same treatment again.

He probably wouldn’t. No one in their right mind would be willing to be put under the influence of love potions repeatedly, especially after that last trial. If Harry had been embarrassed, he couldn’t imagine how Draco had felt.

It was late and everybody else was leaving the pub by the time Harry finally decided what he should do about the testing. He followed Draco to the alley behind the Leaky, where he was about to Disapparate.

“You never got rid of that little stalking problem you used to have, did you?” Draco asked, turning to Harry with a raised eyebrow.

“I was not stalking you,” Harry said. “I was about to ask you to wait a second so I could talk to you.”

Draco didn’t answer, only signalled for Harry to go on.

“I just wanted to thank you for your help with the tests. I suppose I can find someone else to test it for me, but we still don’t really know why it didn’t work and —”

“You are not making any sense, Potter,” Draco interrupted him. “Are you trying to say you don’t want my help anymore?”

“No!” Harry exclaimed, feeling surprised. “I just thought you wouldn’t want to help me anymore and —”

“You should stop assuming things about me and start focusing your brain cells on fixing your charm, Merlin knows you need all of them,” Draco said, rolling his eyes.

“We have some ideas about what went wrong already,” Harry said, choosing to ignore Draco’s comment on his brain cells. It wouldn’t do to start an argument with him just after Draco confirmed that he was still willing to help. “Maybe you could come by tomorrow night if you are not busy?”

“Tomorrow night works for me,” Draco said, not really looking in Harry’s direction. Harry only had time to give him a curt nod before he Disapparated.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry spent the whole next day trying to find a solution to the problem with the charm. He tested his living room for spells that could interfere with it and found nothing. By the end of the day, both he and George concluded that the problem was not with outside interference, but that still left them without knowing what the problem actually was.

Harry was practically buried in notes and books when he heard knocking on the door, and he immediately felt guilty. He had completely forgot to cancel with Draco after it was obvious that Harry and George hadn’t found the root of the problem. Still, he opened the door, prepared to listen to Draco’s complains about his lack of consideration.

Harry’s brain got a little side-tracked when he saw Draco, though. He had always been gorgeous, but something was making him even more appealing  tonight. After spending an embarrassing amount of time looking at Draco, Harry figured it out: His hair was not slicked back as Harry was used to. Draco’s hair was loose and a little messy, but in a stylish way Harry would never be able to do with his own hair.

Draco cleared his throat, managing to divert Harry’s attention away from his hair, while making Harry blush at the same time.

“Come in,” Harry said, trying to hide his embarrassment, and taking a step back to allow Draco to pass.

“Have you found a solution?” Draco asked after Harry closed the door.

“Not yet,” Harry said, avoiding Draco’s eyes.

“Would you be so kind as to enlighten me as to why you didn’t see fit to owl me to cancel, then?” Draco asked, raising one eyebrow.

Harry was not sure if he liked or hated the way Draco lifted his eyebrow, but he thought it wouldn’t be a good idea to focus on that at the moment.

“I was still working on it,” Harry said, pointing to the mess of notes and books on the table. “We have no idea why it isn't working with you, since it worked perfectly with our other two test subjects... It doesn't make any sense.”

“You should probably find someone else to test it, then, like you said yesterday, so you can apply for the patent,” Draco said, averting his eyes.

“No,” Harry said, shaking his head. “We really need to figure out why it doesn’t work for you. If it doesn't work with you, other people might have the same problem, and then the charm wouldn’t be efficient, would it?” he shrugged. “I need to figure this out.”

“I should go then, let you work on it,” Draco said, turning to the door, but for some reason Harry thought he hesitated.

“I really should take a break, though, I've been obsessing over this for days… Maybe if I look at it again later with fresh eyes I can understand why it doesn't work.” Harry paused before taking a deep breath and adding: “Maybe you could keep me company? So I don't feel compelled to go back to work? We could order a pizza and watch the telly. Anything that would distract me for a couple of hours.”

“I don't know, Potter. If we are not doing tests, I should probably go home,” Draco said. His face was a little flushed, and he would not look at Harry.

Harry thought Draco was probably still embarrassed about the other day, so he insisted.

“You were going to be here doing tests anyway, it's not like I'll be keeping you from your plans, right?”

“Right…” Draco said hesitantly. “Alright, I can stay for a couple of hours,” he shrugged. “But, what’s a pizza?” he asked after a few seconds, looking genuinely interested, and making Harry laugh loudly.

“You’ll see.”

Harry didn’t take long to call his favorite pizza place and order up. Draco didn’t seem comfortable standing in the middle of Harry’s living room, and he looked around as if he had no idea what he was supposed to do.

“You can sit down, you know,” Harry said with a half smile. Draco turned around and nodded before sitting stiffly on Harry’s sofa. “Do you want to drink anything?”

Draco only nodded again, making Harry start to think he was doing something wrong. He knew they had never been friends, but since Draco was helping him, he thought they could at least hang out together.

While Harry went to the kitchen to pick up a couple of lagers, he started to think maybe that was exactly the reason Draco looked so uncomfortable. It couldn’t be easy to be friends with Harry after the potions made Draco feel as if he liked Harry. Not even Harry’s closest friends wanted to experience that. And Harry was making Draco stay even though he said he wanted to leave.

Harry returned to the living room feeling awkward.

“You don’t need to stay if you don’t want to, you know,” Harry said, offering the bottle to Draco and sitting beside him.

“Are you kicking me out, Potter?” Draco asked, lifting _that_ eyebrow to Harry.

“Not at all,” Harry said, sinking down on the sofa and putting his feet up on the coffee table. He picked up the remote and turned on the telly.

Harry didn’t really know what to say or how to act around Draco. It was weird having him there, sitting stiffly on the sofa beside Harry, looking at the telly with interest.

“How is your mum doing?” Harry asked, trying to break the awkwardness.

Draco snorted and then said: “She is fine, still trying to marry me to some pure-blood or other, but perfectly fine. Is that really your best attempt at breaking the ice?”

“At least I’m trying. You are just sitting there looking uncomfortable, so what would you do?”

“Have you watched Ginny’s last game?” Draco smirked, Harry laughed, and they started talking about Quidditch.

After the awkwardness lifted, talking to Draco was easier than Harry had ever expected. So much easier that Harry didn’t even notice how much time had passed until someone knocked on the door, and he jumped to his feet to open it.

Harry got back to the sofa with a steaming hot pizza no more than two minutes after he left. Draco observed the box with obvious curiosity, making Harry want to laugh.

“This is a pizza,” Harry said while opening the box with intentional exaggeration.

“It doesn’t look appealing,” Draco said, wrinkling his nose.

“It’s great, trust me,” Harry said, taking a slice and throwing himself back on the sofa.

“Are you seriously expecting me to eat it with my hands?”

“It’s supposed to be eaten with the hands.”

“It’s barbaric.”

“It’s delicious,” Harry said, taking a big bite from his slice.

Draco observed the pizza doubtfully for a few seconds before he picked up a slice and took a bite. Harry watched him intently, trying to figure out if he liked it or not.

“It’s weird,” Draco said, turning his head to look at Harry, “and greasy,” he looked at his fingers with disgust, “and it’s nothing like anything I’ve ever eaten in my life.”

“What does that mean?”

“I like it,” Draco said, and smiled at Harry in a way Harry had never seen before. “I’ve eaten in Muggle restaurants before, but I’ve never had something like this,” he added, looking at his slice of pizza in awe.

Harry was still transfixed by Draco’s smile, so he failed to give him any kind of response.

“Hermione took me to an Italian bistro once, and I think they might have it on the menu, but it didn’t sound appealing at all,” Draco kept talking while observing his slice intently.

“I told you it was good,” Harry said, smiling and taking another slice.

Draco stayed in Harry’s apartments for another few hours. They watched a movie, and Draco told Harry about the first time he went to the cinema with Pansy. When Harry started to doze off on the sofa, Draco excused himself and left.

Harry put the leftovers in the fridge and went to bed. But for the first time in a long time, he felt a little lonely when he closed his eyes to sleep.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry was not paying attention to what was going on around him the next day at the Burrow. He was sat in the kitchen table with Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, and they had started to argue about something or other, but he couldn’t focus. He couldn’t stop thinking about the night before. Technically nothing had happened, but he had that funny feeling in his belly that implied that _something_ had happened.

He considered telling Ron and Hermione about it, but he decided that he would rather keep everything to himself, especially because he didn’t want to make them think there was something there, when he knew it was just him overreacting to a casual and totally platonic night.

It was not realistic to think there was _something_ there. Harry knew that. Before last night Harry wouldn’t even say he considered Draco a friend, much less admit that he might feel something else. But something had changed in their relationship, and Harry could feel it.

“We still need to figure out Harry,” Hermione said, catching Harry’s attention. He had no idea what she meant until Ron answered her:

“He’ll be my best man.”

“And when was that decided?” Hermione asked, putting her hands on her waist, which made her resemble Molly too much. “Why can’t he be my maid of honour?”

“It’s obvious, Hermione, Harry’s a man!” Ron said, opening his arms widely.

“We can call it the man of honour if it’s so important for the position to have a gender!” Hermione replied angrily.

“Okay, so it’s not about the gender,” Ron said, raising his hands in a sign of surrender “but Harry’s my best mate, I want him to be my best man!”

“Harry’s my best friend, too, I want him to be by my side during the wedding!”

“Do they realise that neither of them asked you?” Ginny asked Harry, giggling.

“I hope they don’t,” Harry said, laughing, while his two best friends argued over who would get him. “I really don’t want to get stuck in the middle of this.”

“I thought you were used to it by now,” Ginny said, shaking her head in laughter.

“Well, maybe Harry should decide!” Hermione said eventually, making Harry groan.

“Yes!” Ron exclaimed. “Tell her you want to be my best man, mate!”

“Let him make his own choice, Ron!” Hermione complained.

“I’m not doing this!” Harry said, shaking his head. “If you both want me to be in the wedding, you’ll have to decide what I’ll do. I won’t choose between the two of you!”

“But Harry, she wants you to be her maid of honour!”

“I already said we can change the title if it’s so important!”

“I don’t care!” Harry cut in before they started arguing again. “You decide what you want me to do and I’ll do it, but I won’t choose!”

Both Ron and Hermione groaned and returned to their discussion.

“You already have my sister, you can’t take Harry too!”

“You can keep Ginny if you want to!”

“Hey!” Ginny yelped. “I’m right here!”

“Sorry,” Hermione said, blushing a little. “I really want you to be one of my bridesmaids, Ginny.”

“Yeah, sure,” Ginny said, rolling her eyes, and leaving the kitchen.

“Do you think she got upset?” Hermione said, looking at the kitchen door with concern.

“Nah, she is just trying to get away from us,” Ron said with a dismissive hand wave.

“We are pushing people away,” Hermione sighed. “This is ridiculous, we shouldn’t be fighting over who is going to do what in the wedding.”

“Yeah, it’s ridiculous,” Ron said, nodding. “So, Harry will be my best man, and you can apologise to Ginny and invite her to be your maid of honour.”

“I’m not stupid, Ron, I’m not falling for this!” Hermione snapped. “Just say what you’d rather do, Harry, I won’t be upset if you choose Ron,” she added, turning to him.

“I told you, I won’t choose. And if you insist on it I won’t be in the wedding at all!” Harry said, standing up and following Ginny to the living room.

“Still arguing?” Ginny asked, smirking.

“You know they are,” Harry snorted and sat beside her on the sofa.

“At least now Hermione seems to be interested in the wedding,” Ginny shrugged. “Do you know what happened? Ron spent a night here last week, and I thought for sure that she had called the wedding off again.”

“I don’t really know what they talked about, but I know they finally talked,” Harry said with a little smile.

“Does that mean you totally know everything both of them are thinking but won’t tell me because you are too loyal to them?” Ginny asked, raising one eyebrow to Harry.

Ginny’s eyebrows were not even close to appealing, especially compared to Draco’s eyebrows, Harry thought. And wasn’t that a weird thing for him to notice?

“Maybe,” Harry shrugged.

“You see, that’s why our relationship could never work,” Ginny said, poking him and shaking her head fondly. “You are way too loyal to my brother.”

Harry was about to answer when the front door opened and George came in.

“Harry,” he greeted, looking excited. “I think I figured it out!”

“Really?” Harry asked, standing up.

“I wasn’t even looking for a solution!” George said, taking a new prototype from his pocket, this one a golden necklace. “I was just trying to figure out how I can apply the same principles to other products, but I think this might work for our problem!”

“What did you do?” Harry asked, picking up the necklace and examining it with interest.

“Changed the activation principles and placed a stronger detector. Maybe something in your subject’s organism was delaying the activation.” George shrugged. “Who knows, right?”

“Right,” Harry said, still analysing the new prototype. “I really hope that was it…”

 

~~x~~

 

Harry owled Draco the moment he got home on Sunday saying they might have found a solution to the charm problem and that he would be free on Wednesday night. He had a hard time concentrating on his job on Monday and Tuesday, though. He couldn’t stop thinking about the next time he and Draco would be alone together in his apartment.

It was stupid to think anything could happen. But he still had that funny feeling in his belly when he waited for Draco to show up Wednesday night.

He jumped to his feet to open the door when he heard the now-familiar knocking.

Draco had his hair slicked back this time, and he looked like he had come straight from the Ministry.

“Hi, come in,” Harry said, stepping away for Draco to pass and closing the door behind him.

“Your manners are improving impressively,” Draco said, smirking.

“I’m a fast learner,” Harry shrugged.

“I gather you finally figured out the problem with the charm?” Draco asked, raising _that_ eyebrow.

“Actually George did it,” Harry said, taking the necklace from his rucksack. “He told me he was studying how to apply the same concept to other products and stumbled on a possible solution.” He shrugged and gave Draco the necklace. “So, do you want to drink something, or would you rather go straight to the tests?”

“Let’s get the tests done first,” Draco said with a half-smile while putting the necklace on. And then he added with less confidence: “If everything works to plan we can have a drink and watch a movie after?”

“Yeah,” Harry grinned. There was nothing he would rather do with his night, Harry thought, while he summoned a glass from the kitchen and served the potion to Draco. “This one is the _Kissing Concoction_. It says it will give the dosed person an irresistible impulse to kiss the giver of the potion,” he read on the label.

“Everything I always wanted,” Draco laughed and then chugged down the potion.

For a second everything seemed to be okay, and then Draco's eyes lost focus. Without any kind of warning Draco jumped Harry, and it was only thanks to Harry's reflexes that they didn't kiss.

Harry held Draco at arm’s-length, but Draco kept trying to draw closer to him. Harry gave thanks for all his Auror training and was about to try to grab his wand to stun Draco when he said:

“Please, kiss me, Potter.”

Draco was begging him for a kiss. And Harry wanted it, he wanted that kiss so much. But he couldn’t. Not when Draco was not aware of what he was doing. Not when it was not real.

He had started to believe they could have something real eventually, but he knew that if he gave in to that desire now and kissed Draco while he was under the effect of the potion, he would never deserve the chance.

Harry took a deep breath, reminded himself again that that was just the potion talking, and concentrated all his power on taking the antidote from his pocket — which was hard with Draco still trying to reach his lips.

“Alright, I’ll kiss you,” he said, locking eyes with Draco, “but you’ll have to drink this, and then we can do whatever you want.”

Draco let him go and reached for the glass eagerly. A second after the potion touched his lips the change was obvious and undeniable. He was back to normal. He took a few moments to straighten his robes and checked if his hair was in place — of course it was in place — slicked back the way it was.

“I gather you’ll do whatever I want now?” He smirked.

“You know I had to say that to convince you to drink,” Harry said, feeling his cheeks getting warm.

Draco rolled his eyes, and then said: “Do you want to try another one?”

“What’s the point?” Harry grunted and threw himself on the sofa. “If it’s not working with the _Kissing Concoction_ I doubt it’ll work with any of the stronger ones,” he said, burying his face on his hands. “I think it was stupid of me to think I could make this work, I’m not good at this, not at all.”

“I thought the great Harry Potter could do anything,” Draco snorted.

“Oh well, you were wrong.” Harry sighed.

“Maybe,” Draco said, and then, after a long pause, he added: “I never pictured you as a quitter, but I guess you are right, I’ve been wrong about you once or twice.”

“I’m not a quitter,” Harry said, taking his hands away from his face, and locking eyes with Draco.

“So stop being stupid and try the next potion so you can gather more information.”

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Harry asked, staring at Draco doubtfully.

“I told you I was going to help you, so I’m helping you, now go get the next potion. We don’t have the whole night to indulge your self-pity,” Draco said and clapped his hands for Harry to get off the sofa.

“You are a really demanding test subject,” Harry grunted, standing up.

“Unlucky for you, I’m the only one you’ve got,” Draco smirked.

Harry picked up the glass from the coffee table and poured the next potion.

“ _First Love Beguiling Bubbles_ ,” he said. “It’s the one Romilda Vane tried to use on me back in sixth year.” Harry bit his lip, suddenly remembering Ron collapsing in Slughorn’s office. He shook his head. That had happened a long time ago, and it was not a good idea for him to dwell on the past.

“How do you know this was the one?” Draco asked. He also didn’t look comfortable anymore, and Harry could kick himself for bringing it up.

“After…” he hesitated for a second, and then continued: “After everything, Hermione went after her, and I don’t know exactly what she did, but Romilda never tried to dose me again.” Harry shrugged. “So, this one is supposed to make the dosed person convinced that the giver is _the one_.”

“I can see why Romilda would want to give The Chosen One a potion that would convince you that she was _the one._ ” Draco snorted.

“Just drink it,” Harry grunted, handing Draco the glass.

Draco’s eyes unfocused, and Harry knew it hadn’t worked. He was supposed to be taking more notes and trying to figure out what was wrong, but he felt like a failure.

Harry was already picking the antidote from his robes’ pocket when Draco dropped down on one knee, staring into Harry’s eyes intensely.

“I’ve been dreaming about this for years, Potter. I have always known that I wanted to spend my whole life with you. Will you marry me?”

That was unexpected. He knew the potion was supposed to make Draco believe Harry was _the one,_ but being compelled to propose was a little too much, wasn’t it?

“I’ll answer you in a second, just drink this first, please,” Harry said, giving Draco the antidote, which he drank excitedly. After a second he was back to normal.

“Well, mother would be thrilled if you said yes,” Draco said sarcastically.

“Would she, though?” Harry asked, laughing a little. Draco’s mood was much better this time around than the first time they were doing tests, and that affected Harry’s mood too.

“Of course she would,” Draco rolled his eyes. “You are the catch of the century, why else would you have so many people trying to dose you?”

“Wouldn’t your mother be upset about the fact that I wouldn’t be able to give you a little Malfoy heir?” Harry asked, still laughing.

“Not really,” Draco shrugged. “There are always other ways. Even Muggles have ways, like artificial insemination and surrogacy,” he added with a dismissive hand wave.

“You’ve been researching it?” Harry asked, trying to raise one eyebrow, like Draco did, and failing miserably.

“If I want to convince my family that I can find my own partner and still give them an heir, I need to do research,” Draco said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“Yeah, makes sense,” Harry snorted, and shook his head.

He couldn’t believe he was having _that_ conversation with Draco. Many times before he thought his life was a little too absurd to be real, but then things like this just kept happening over and over again.

“Do you think the excess of love potions might be starting to affect you?” Harry asked, trying to hold his laughter.

“Love potions don’t have lasting effects after the administration of the antidote,” Draco said. “How someone who knows nothing about potions got involved in something like this, I’ll never understand.”

“Why do you think we are doing a charm and not some kind of preventive potion?” Harry grinned.

“Because there is no such thing as a preventive potion?” Draco asked, with _the_ eyebrow raised.

“I have two other potions here, if you still want to try?” Harry asked, choosing to ignore Draco’s previous statement.

“Why do you insist on asking stupid questions?” Draco asked, rolling his eyes. “I told you I would help you gather more data. Let’s get this done so we can have a drink and watch the telly.”

“Alright,” Harry cleaned the glass and poured the new potion. “This one is _Love is Blind Eye Serum,_ which is supposed to make the dosed person think the giver is the most beautiful person in the world,” he read in the label and gave Draco the glass.

“Be ready for some great compliments,” Draco said, drinking the whole dose.

Draco crooked his neck, looking at Harry intensely. He was a little paler than normal, and his eyes were too wide.

“Damn Potter, you look hot!” Draco said, looking over Harry from top to bottom appreciatively. “Your messy hair always makes you look like you just got shagged and that always makes me so hard!”

Harry was blushing, a lot, and there was no way Draco would not notice.

“Here, drink this,” Harry said, without even trying to think of a reason to make Draco drink the antidote.

Draco didn’t need to be convinced to drink, though. He downed the antidote the minute Harry placed it in his hand.

“You look embarrassed,” Draco smirked when he was back to his normal, non-complimentary self.

“Your compliments were a little blunt, I wasn’t expecting it,” Harry said, blushing even harder while taking notes on Draco’s reactions to the potion.

Draco laughed, shaking his head, and then asked: “You said there is another one?”

“Yeah, the last one from the _Wonder Witch Line_ , _Twilight Moonbeams._ It’s just a infatuation potion, there are no other effects,” Harry said, analysing the label quickly, before pouring it in the glass and handing it to Draco.

Draco’s eyelids dropped after he drank. He smiled dreamily, and his whole body relaxed.

“I would be happy to spend the rest of my life here with you,” he murmured. “You smell so good, you definitely don’t stink.” Draco added with a loose smile.

“That’s good to know,” Harry said, taking a step closer to Draco, who didn’t seem likely to jump Harry this time around. He poured the antidote and gave to Draco. “Here, drink this so we can have a real drink and watch a movie.”

“Okay,” Draco said, complacently, and drank the antidote.

Draco became more alert immediately after the antidote touched his lips, but he looked a little uncomfortable this time around.

“That one, that one is really bad,” Draco said, shaking his head.

“It didn’t look as bad as some of the others,” Harry said, a little confused.

“It’s weird,” Draco said, rubbing his forehead a little. “It felt like I had to do anything you asked me to.”

“Don’t the others feel like that?” Harry frowned.

“Not exactly,” Draco sighed. “It’s different. With the others it feels like _I_ want to do everything. I felt compelled to touch you, or to declare my undying love for you, or to propose. This one felt like you were the one in control. It’s scary.”

“They all scare me,” Harry said, nodding his understanding. “Thank Merlin George decided to stop selling them.”

“How about you give me that drink now, Potter?” Draco asked, still looking a little shaken, and sat down on the sofa.

Harry put away the remaining potions and grabbed a couple of lagers from his fridge, before sitting beside Draco and turning on the tv.

“George really thought that enhancing the detector and changing the activation principles would work,” Harry sighed after a few moments of silence. “I have no idea how to fix it.”

“The other test subjects resisted all the potions?” Draco asked, staring fixedly at the telly.

“Yeah,” Harry said, and started looking for the copies of George’s notes. “They say they felt the compulsion to reach George, just like you felt it, but that they could feel that it was not natural and choose if they wanted to follow the impulse or not.”

“So the problem is definitely with me?” Draco asked, and Harry noticed that his legs were stirring.

“I guess there is something different with you,” Harry sighed. “But other people would probably have the same result, and the charm wouldn’t work for them either.” Harry shook his head. “So all this work was for nothing.”

“Are you giving up?” Draco asked, without looking at Harry. “What you are trying to do is really good, Potter. Hermione’s ideas are great, but she won’t be able to change everybody’s perspective on the issue as fast as she wants to. In the meantime, people could use a way to protect themselves.”

“I know,” Harry said, closing his eyes and laying his head on the back of the sofa. He had had a tiring day at work, and the charm failure made him feel more tired. He yawned. “But I don’t know how to fix it, and we already tried everything we could think of.”

“Maybe you are too close to it.” Draco’s voice was low and soothing, and Harry started to relax a little.

“What do you think we should do?” Harry asked, snuggling up a little on the sofa.

“Theo had a lot of ideas last Friday, and he said he would be able to help you more if he had time to disassemble the charm. Maybe you could find someone to take a look at it.”

“Do you think Hermione would?” Harry asked, yawning again.

“I’m sure she would,” Harry heard Draco snorting. “She wouldn’t be able to resist.”

They both stayed silent for a long time after that, so long that Harry was not sure if he were awake anymore.

“I really should go now.” Draco’s voice sounded far away. Harry felt something warm ghosting over his face for a second, and then he completely dozed off.

 

~~x~~

 

Harry woke up the next morning still on the sofa. His neck was hurting like crazy after spending the whole night crooked, and his back was killing him.  Sleeping on the sofa was always a terrible idea.

It took him a few seconds to remember what had happened the night before, and he was not sure if he had dreamed Draco caressing his cheek before leaving or not. He shook his head, trying to order his thoughts, and rose to go to work.

He had trouble concentrating the whole day. Harry couldn’t stop thinking about Draco’s hand on his face, or the dream he had had about Draco’s hand on his face. Either way, he was useless to the Auror department, so he decided to go see Hermione at the DRCMC.

“Harry,” Hermione greeted him warmly as he entered her cubicle. “What brings you here?”

“Not work,” Harry laughed, throwing himself at the chair in front of her desk.

She looked around for a second before lowering her voice and saying: “That’s good, because I’m not working either.” She giggled.

“What are you doing?” Harry asked with a conspiratory smile.

“Wedding plans,” Hermione said, rolling her eyes as if she thought she were being silly. “My mum really wants us to have a traditional wedding arch, it’s something everybody from my dad’s family had at their wedding. It’s supposed to be a symbol of the future home we are going to start after the wedding and the passage from being single to being married.”

“That’s interesting,” Harry lied, making Hermione laugh.

“It’s important to my mum that we have a lot of Muggle things in the wedding.” She shrugged. “She said that if she can’t invite our extended family and friends, at least she wants to be able to take a lot of pictures. She even bought Ron a suit.” Hermione sighed. “But I want to make the wedding arch represent something else, too.”

“Tell me,” Harry said, giving her a fond smile.

“You know how I was feeling, right?” Hermione said, shaking her head. “So I wanted to use the wood from my wand and the wood from Ron’s wand to compose the arch. I want to intertwine the woods to make it, so that we can still clearly perceive each of the branches, but that they form a single strong structure.”

“You and Ron together, but without you disappearing into him,” Harry said, nodding his understanding.

“Exactly!” Hermione said, opening a bright smile. “What about you? Why aren’t you working?”

“The charm still doesn’t work, and we have no idea why,” Harry sighed, shaking his head. “So I was thinking that maybe we need some outside perspective.”

“Do you have your notes?” Hermione asked, nodding, and extending her hand for Harry to give her the notes.

“You don’t need to do it if you are too busy,” Harry said, taking his notes from his pocket and giving to her.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said with a dismissive hand wave. “I’ll tell you in a few days if I find anything.”

 

~~x~~

 

Hermione hadn’t given him an answer yet by Friday. So he went to the Leaky with no prospect of a new testing date.

Harry wouldn’t admit it to anyone else, but making the charm work was not the reason why he wanted Hermione to find a solution quickly. Of course it was one of the reasons. But having Draco back at his flat was his priority at the moment.

When Harry sat on their usual booth with everybody else around him, the first thing he noticed was Draco. He looked normal, not at all like someone who had been caressing Harry’s cheek while Harry was asleep lately. But he looked happier than normal.

For a second Harry looked around and thought about how people would react if he and Draco ever got together. He knew Hermione would support him, since she always did. And Ron had learned to be friendly to Draco over the past year. Both of them still teased Harry about his obsession with Draco, so they probably wouldn’t even be shocked. The others would be surprised, but they would get used to it.

Draco was laughing at something Pansy said, and Harry was talking to Ginny and Luna about dirigible plums, when they locked eyes. Draco’s cheeks flushed the lightest shade of pink, and he gave Harry the smallest of smiles before he turned back to Pansy.

That could only mean Harry was not crazy, and there was something going on between them, right? Harry really needed Hermione to figure out the problem with the charm so he could ask Draco over again.

It was almost a full week later that Hermione asked him to go to her flat because she had something for him.

“I’m pretty sure I know what’s wrong,” Hermione said, when they were both sat together on the sofa at her and Ron’s flat.

Ron was in the kitchen baking. Apparently he had decided to prove to his mum that he didn’t need anyone to cook for him, and had found out that he was rather good at it.

“And what’s the problem?” Harry asked, without hiding his excitement.

“Tell me something first,” Hermione said, looking at Harry’s eyes intently. “You are the one doing the tests with this subject, right?”

“Yeah, does it make any difference?”

Hermione nodded once before saying: “I could only find one flaw in your charm work. You see, when you changed your focus from the infatuation effect to the diminishment of rational thought effect, you never considered the possibility of the subject already being in love with the doser. In this case, the infatuation only increases to unbearable levels, and the subject effectively can't control themselves, even when the charm tries to keep them sane.”

That made sense, but at the same time, it didn’t. If Hermione were right, and she usually was, then Draco had feelings for Harry since before their first test. Back when Harry didn’t even consider them friends, and who knows for how long before that.

So why would Draco volunteer to be Harry’s test subject?

“What does that mean?” Harry asked, more to himself than to Hermione.

“That you obviously never considered the possibility of someone using a love potion on someone already in love with them. But you should have!” Hermione said. And Harry had the impression that she wanted to keep him focused on the charm and not on the other implications of what she said, at least for now.

“Why?” Harry asked, trying to ignore the fact that Draco had to be in love with him. “I mean, they are already in love, there is no harm, right?”

“Wrong!” Hermione shook her head. “The person may be already in love, but it doesn't mean it's okay to take away their ability to make their own choices when it comes to their bodies! Maybe the person is not up to some kinds of sexual intercourse, or maybe the person is just not ready to have intercourse at all, and their partner is using a love potion to force them. That is still rape! Even when they are in a relationship! Even if they are in love!”

“When you say it like that it makes sense,” Harry said, nodding.

“And that’s just the sexual aspect of it,” Hermione sighed deeply. “The person might just be in a moment when they would rather not be with someone, or they might be in another relationship, or they may like the doser, but don’t want to be with them for whatever reason! I mean, there are hundreds of reasons why someone who is already in love wouldn’t want to be with the person they are in love with!”

Harry nodded, he could perfectly see her point.

“What doesn't make sense is the _Flirting Fancies_ , though.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, _Flirting Fancies_ is an unfocused potion, it makes the subject flirt with everybody around them, so it doesn't have anything to do with the attraction the subject feels for the doser. Shouldn't the amulet work then?”

“Was there anyone else in the room?” Hermione asked. “Or just the subject and the doser?”

“Only the subject and the doser.” Harry said, “but it shouldn’t make any difference in this case.”

“But it does, Harry,” Hermione said, going through Harry’s notes. “I’ve been studying the formulas George gave me, and the _Flirting Fancies_ one is really interesting. It's like a love potion mixed with a lust potion, but with the additional compulsion spell that makes the person flirt. The effect of the potion is similar to the effects of alcohol.”

“I know that, Hermione, we studied it before crafting the charm.”

“So you also know the amulet would make the impulse to flirt feel unnatural. But if the subject already had a desire to flirt with the person near them, they wouldn't be able to resist. Just like they wouldn't be able to resist any of the other potions’ general effects. Because they already feel it!”

“So the charm wouldn’t make it feel fake,” Harry said, nodding. “That makes sense! Does this mean that everything the subject did or said while under the effect of the potions were things that they already wanted to do?”

“Yes, and no,” Hermione said, frowning. “It’s complicated. The underlying feeling was already there, so some of the things they said were probably real, but you have to take into account the compulsion spells in some of the potions. The subject might already have the impulse to ask the doser out, but the potion magnifies it to an unbearable level, making it impossible for the subject not to ask the doser out, even if they don’t want to at the moment, or if they would rather ask the doser out in a different manner.”

“Now our only problem is how do we fix it?” Harry sighed.

“I was thinking about that, too,” Hermione said, giving Harry a small smile. “Instead of the charm only neutralizing the loss of rational thought, it should also enhance the subject’s discernment capability. Maybe you could include a neurological enhancer in the charm instead of only the blocker.”

“Wouldn’t the enhancer increase people’s brain power all the time, though?”

“Not if it’s only activated by the consumption of the key ingredients.”

“But this change would make the enhancer affect everybody who uses the charm, and not only the ones that are already in love with the perpetrator.”

“Yeah, they would have their neural capabilities enhanced while the potion is in their system, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, you know?” Hermione shrugged. “A little more discernment wouldn’t hurt anyone, and we have to consider that there are some people with less willpower than others. Having the enhancer would guarantee that everybody would be able to actually avoid the perpetrator!”

Hermione gave him all her notes along with her suggestions to improve the charm.

“Other than that, the charm work is beautiful,” Hermione said with a little smile, “you should be proud of it.”

“I’ll be if it works,” Harry sighed.

“Will you tell me who your test subject is?” Hermione asked, raising one eyebrow.

“I don’t think they would be happy with me breaking their trust,” Harry said, leaning against the back of the sofa. “But I might tell you after I make sure the charm will work.” And he couldn’t keep away the little smile that invaded his face.

Hermione looked at him for a second and then she gave an excited laugh: “You are interested in this person!”

“Who is Harry interested in?” Ron asked, choosing that moment to enter the living room with a plate of ginger and honey biscuits that smelled like heaven.

“I’m not telling!” Harry said, laughing a little. He wanted to, but he had to talk to Draco first, especially after what Hermione had said. “It doesn’t matter. At least not right now.”

“When will it matter?” Ron asked, throwing himself on the sofa beside Hermione.

“After I talk to them,” Harry said, feeling hopeful.

“Take the person to the wedding,” Hermione said, with a supportive smile. “If you are really interested in them, that is.”

“I’ll see,” Harry said, shaking his head, but not losing his smile. “So, neither of you ever told me how your talk went.”

Hermione smiled brightly, and said: “You were absolutely right, you know?” Ron held her hand and they exchanged a loving look. “Ron was great about it.”

“I never expected you to be like my mum, ‘Mione,” Ron said, looking her in the eyes with a loving smile. “And we don’t need to have kids, if you don’t want to.”

“I want to,” Hermione whispered. “Eventually.”

“Yeah,” Ron said, and then turned to Harry. “And I told her that when that happens we can talk about it and figure out what we want to do, and that I don’t mind taking a leave of absence from the Aurors until the kids are a little bigger.” He shrugged. “I could even take George up on his offer and work with him at Wheezes in the meantime.”

“I bet you’d be the greatest parents,” Harry said, beaming.

“And we agreed that this whole changing your last name ordeal is just a misogynistic way to control women and make sure women would never be able to be their own person,” Ron said, earning a big smile from Hermione.

“So after the wedding I’ll be Hermione Granger-Weasley, instead of Hermione Weasley,” Hermione said, looking proud.

“And have the two of you decided what I’m doing at your wedding?”

“Yes,” Hermione said, and for some reason both of them blushed intensely. “I won’t tell you what the negotiations entailed, but you’ll be my man of honour.”

Ron nodded with a huge grin on his face, and Harry decided that he didn’t want to know.

“Do I have to wear a dress?” Harry asked, laughing.

“Don’t be silly!” Hermione said, shoving him playfully. “Just wear robes that match the bridesmaids’ and we’ll be fine.”

“Do I want to know the colour of the bridesmaids’ dresses?” Harry asked Ron with a grimace.

“Mum will take care of it, let it be a surprise,” Ron said, laughing.

Harry left their flat a few hours later. He felt weird. If Hermione was right, Draco was in love with him. Harry had already thought there might be something going on between them, but being in love came as a surprise.

And what about Harry? How did he feel about Draco? He knew he had some feelings, but he had never named them before.

He liked being around Draco, a lot. And he thought Draco was gorgeous, there was no doubt there. But what was he feeling?

That was not how he had ever expected things to happen, and it was not fair to Draco. Hermione was right about that part. If Draco really were in love with Harry, he probably had his reasons for not revealing it. And the fact that the malfunctioning charm had made him do that without his consent was a huge problem. Harry should not have known Draco’s feelings without Draco’s agreement.

Everything about it was confusing Harry too much. So he decided that he should probably let it sink in for a little while before making any rash  decisions.

He took Hermione’s notes to George, and they spent a few days working on the enhancer and setting it to the right parameters. Harry even skipped pub night, both because he wanted to finish the charm, and because he was still trying to figure out how he felt about Draco.

 

~~x~~

 

It was almost a week later by the time Harry decided that he had everything figured out. They had the prototype ready again, and George had already tested the improved model with his subjects. So he only needed to test it on Draco. If it worked they would be able to send their patent application to the Ministry.

And if it worked it meant that Draco had feelings for Harry, and Harry would be ready to tell him the feelings were mutual.

But if Hermione was wrong —  not a common occurrence, but it happened once or twice before — they would go back to having no idea what was the problem with the charm, and if that were the case, Harry and George had decided they would just start over from scratch. All in all Harry had enjoyed working on the charm, but he really didn’t want to do everything all over again.

He owled Draco, asking if he could come by the next day after work, while trying to keep himself focused on the charm, and not on his feelings.

He arrived at Harry’s flat minutes after Harry himself got home. Draco looked like he had came straight from the Ministry again, but his hair was a little messed up. Draco probably caught Harry staring at his hair, because he immediately said:

“Some prat sent a flammable piglet to the DRCMC. Hermione and I spent the last hour and a half running after the thing.”

“Do you think it was a prank?” Harry asked, having a hard time keeping himself from laughing.

“We hope it was a prank,” Draco said. “You’ve been gone for awhile,” he added, sounding curious.

“I followed your advice and asked for Hermione’s help with the charm,” Harry shrugged. Now that it was time, he felt awkward.

“I gather she found a solution, since you asked me to come,” Draco asked, raising that annoying eyebrow at Harry.

“Yeah, we think she did, but I guess we’ll only know for sure after we try it, right?”

“Right.” Draco nodded. “Let’s get this over with.”

Harry took a deep breath before removing the potion from his pocket. He had decided to go straight for the strongest love potion this time around. It was trickier, since unlike the Wheezes’ ones that were spell activated, this one only worked for the brewer, and Harry was not all that good with potions.

The woody smell of broom polish and mint invaded his nostrils as he poured the potion in the glass. Draco’s face changed immediately, and Harry was sure he knew exactly what that potion was.

“That’s _Amortentia,_ ” Draco said, looking at Harry in disbelief. “Are you sure we should be using the strongest love potion in the world for this test?”

“We are not supposed to start with the strongest one,” Harry shrugged, handing Draco the glass, “but that’s it, if it works this time we have the charm. If it doesn’t, we’ll bin everything and start over. So I figured we should start with the strongest and get this over with. It's all or nothing.”

“And you brewed it?” Draco asked, observing Harry intently. Harry nodded. “I see.”

Draco studied the potion thoughtfully for a second before drinking it in one gulp. His face changed a little, and Harry thought he and George would have to start over. But instead of trying to grab Harry or starting to declare his love, Draco grimaced, as if he were concentrating on something.

“I can feel it,” Draco said, looking at Harry intensely, “but I’m fully aware that this is the potion’s effect.”

“It works?” Harry whispered, having trouble speaking any louder.

“It works,” Draco nodded. “Now give me the antidote, please,” he added, grimacing again.

“We should…” Harry hesitated. He had been expecting it to work, and he knew what that meant, but it was still shocking to have the proof right in front of him. So he decided to focus on the testing. “We should try the others so you can sign the forms.”

“Sure,” Draco said, frowning.

They spent an hour testing the charm against the other potions, and according to Draco, they were easier to resist than Amortentia. He signed all the forms, and Harry felt relieved to know that at least that was over.

“So, what did Hermione find out?” Draco asked, still standing in the middle of Harry’s living room.

“She had an idea, and her ideas are usually correct, but I don’t want to assume anything,” Harry said, feeling awkward.

Harry threw himself on the sofa and sighed. He couldn’t just go all out and say he knew Draco had feelings for him. That would be ridiculous, and would probably screw everything up.

“Spill it, Potter,” Draco said, staring down at Harry.

“Hermione said we never considered the possibility of someone dosing a person who already had feelings for the doser,” Harry said in a single breath. “She said it wouldn’t work because the induced feelings on top of the feelings the person already had would be too much to resist.”

Draco’s cheeks flushed, and he turned to the door as if he were about to run away from Harry’s flat.

“Is she right?” Harry asked in a small voice.

“I don’t know what you are talking about, Potter!” Draco spit out, like he used to back in school, and that made Harry think that Hermione was absolutely right.

“If that’s right I…” Harry paused and took a deep breath before continuing, “I’ve been obsessed with you since we were eleven. I’m not saying I felt something good for you back then, but I’ve always had strong feelings for you, too. I mean, I can still remember when we found out we were going to have our first flying lessons with the Slytherins, and the first thing I thought was that I didn't want to make a fool out of myself in front of you. It's a weird thing for a eleven-year-old to think, innit?”

“You were rather obsessed with me back in sixth year, too,” Draco said, not looking Harry in the eyes.

“And I did some rather stupid things because of it,” Harry said. “But you see, after everything was over, and we started to really get to know each other, I kept being obsessed with you! I never stopped!”

“What are you trying to say?” Draco asked, biting his lips.

“That I have feelings for you, and that I’ve always had feelings for you, but now they are actually good feelings,” Harry said, standing up, and stepping closer to Draco. “And that I want to know if Hermione is right and the reason the charm was not working with you is because you also have feelings for me.”

“Are you saying that because you feel sorry for me? Because I don’t need your pity.”

“No, of course not!” Harry shook his head. “I’m saying it because it’s the truth.”

“I’ve always had feelings for you, too,” Draco said, looking away from Harry. “I hated you at first because you humiliated me, and then I hated you because you were right about the war. Then I hated you because I liked you. And then you saved my life, and kept me and mother out of Azkaban, and I couldn’t pretend I hated you anymore.”

“I’ve been thinking about you non-stop since you started working with Hermione, or rather, since the end of the war,” Harry said, taking another step closer to Draco. “I like you, Draco.”

With that Draco finally looked at Harry. They locked eyes, and Harry took another step closer. Draco’s eyes dropped to Harry’s mouth for less than a second, and Harry couldn’t avoid doing the same when Draco bit his lips.

Harry would never be able to say who closed the gap between them first, but in a split second they had their mouths all over each other. Draco’s lips were hot, he tasted minty, and Harry could barely control himself enough.

“I like you, Harry,” Draco mumbled in between kisses, and Harry melted listening to his name on Draco’s lips. “I really do.”

They kissed for a long time, and it was so overwhelming that Harry had no idea how they had ended up laying on the sofa. Eventually they stopped, and just lay there, Harry on top of Draco, looking into each other’s eyes.

“I decided to help you test the charm because I thought it wouldn’t change anything,” Draco said, after a long time, running his fingers along Harry’s cheek. “We were not friends, and I already liked you. But then things seemed to change anyway.”

“I was already obsessed with you, but things changed for me after we started testing,” Harry said, catching Draco’s other hand.

They spent a few more minutes there, just enjoying each other’s company.

Being in Draco’s arms made Harry feel even more sure that he liked it, that he wanted to have Draco in his life.

“Do you want to go with me to Ron and Hermione’s wedding?” Harry murmured.

“I’m going to the wedding, Harry, I was invited.”

“I know,” Harry sighed, “I mean, do you want to go as my date?”

“You are aware of what taking someone as a date to a wedding means, right?” Draco asked, raising his head a little.

“That a wedding is happening and I want a date?” Harry asked.

“No,” Draco said, looking intense. “It means that you have serious intentions.”

“I didn’t know that,” Harry said with a little smile. “So, is that a yes?”

“I… Yes, I want to go to their wedding as your date.”

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt I chose allowed me to explore consent all throughout the fic, especially regarding the ethics of love potions. I chose to focus on the emotional aspects of it rather than the physical ones. And on the fact that desire does not automatically mean consent.
> 
> Find me on [Tumblr](https://must-love-drarry.tumblr.com/)


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